
Book.-*— l1- 



SLAVERY AND ANTI-SLAVERY; 



A HISTORY OF THE 



GREAT STRUGGLE IN BOTH HEMISPHERES; 



WITH A VIEW OF 



THE SLAVERY QUESTION 



UNITED STATES. 



BY 

WILLIAM '60ODELL, 

AUTHOR OF "THE DEYOCRACY OF CHEISTIASIIY." 
THIRD EDITION. 

NEW-YORK : 
WILLIAM GOODELL, 

4S BEEKMAX-STREET 
1855. 



' ' 



Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the Year One Thousand Eight Hundred 
and Fifty-two, by WILLIAM GOODELL, in the Clerk's Office of the District 
Court of the United States, for the Southern District of New York. 



C. A. ALVOP.D, PRINTER, 

29 Gold-st., N. Y. 



J. P. JONES & CO., STEREOTTrERS, 

183 William-street, N. Y. 



\\ 



If 



4\ 



CONTENTS 



CHAPTER I. page. 

s Magnitude and necessity of the struggle. J 

CHAPTER II. 

Origin of the modern Slave Trade and Slavery 1 

CHAPTER III. 
v Slavery and the Slave Trade in the British Colonies in North America, 

now the United States 1° 

CHAPTER IV. 

Early testimonies against Slavery and the Slave Trade 27 

CHAPTER V. 
Action of religious bodies against the Slave Trade and Slavery, com- 
mencing before the American Revolution, and the results 32 

CHAPTER VI. 

Of Slavery and its abolition in England 44 

CHAPTER VII. 

Of efforts for abolishing the African Slave Trade 53 

CHAPTER VIII. 
Period of the American Revolution, and the establishment of an inde- 
pendent Government 69 

CHAPTER IX. 
Era of forming the Federal Constitution 81 



1-V CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER X. pace. 

Of direct anti-Slavery efforts, including ecclesiastical action, from the 
period of the Revolution to the close of the last century ; and the 
abolition of Slavery in the Northern States 91 

CHAPTER XI. 
Decline of the spirit of Liberty, and growth of Slavery, since the Re- 
volution ; their causes and early manifestations 118 

CHAPTER XII. 

Position of the American Churches respecting Slavery, during the first 
half of the Nineteenth Century. — I. Methodist Episcopal Church. 143 

CHAPTER XIII. 
Position of the American Churches, &c. (continued). — II. The Pres- 
byterian Church 151 

CHAPTER XIV. 
Position of the American Churches, &c. (continued). — III. Con- 

gregationalists 163 

CHAPTER XV. 
Position of the American Churches, &c. (continued). — IV. Baptists. 183 

CHAPTER XVI. 
Position of the American Churches, &c. (continued). — V. The 
Protestant Episcopal Church 191 

CHAPTER XVII. 
Position of the American Churches, &c. (continued). — VI. Other 
Sects — General view 195 

CHAPTER XVIII. 
Position of the American Churches, &c. (continued). — VII. Volun- 
tary Associations connected with several Sects — Conclusion 202 

CHAPTER XIX. 
Action of the Federal Government, to the close of the first Presiden- 
tial Administration 220 

CHAPTER XX. 
Subsequent action of the Federal Government — Colored people — Slave 
territory — New Slave States — Federal District 237 

CHAPTER XXI. 
Further action of the Federal Government — American Slave Trade — 
African Slave Trade 2 17 



CONTENTS. V 

CHAPTER XXII. 

Further action of the Federal Government — Continued subserviency 
of the national diplomacy to the demands of the Slaveholders 263 

CHAPTER XXIII. 
Further action of the Federal Government — Ilayti — Florida — Sem- 
inole War 268 

CHAPTER XXIV. 

Further action of the Federal Government — Acquisition of Texas 272 

CHAPTER XXV. 
Conspiracy for the conquest of Mexico, and the disrupture of the 
Federal Union in 1806 — Controlling power of the Conspirators over 
the Federal Judiciary 280 

CHAPTER XXVI. 
Further action of the Federal Government — The war with Mexico — 
Acquisition of California, New Mexico, and Utah 287 

CHAPTER XXVII. 
Further action of the Federal Government — Result of the Conquest 
of California — Its admission as a Free State — "The Compromise." 306 

CHAPTER XXVIII. 
Further action of the Federal Government — General policy, and 
political economy, controlled by Slavery 310 

CHAPTER XXIX. 
Colonization Society 311 

CHAPTER XXX. 
Abolition of Slavery in the British Colonies 353 

CHAPTER XXXI. 

Distinctive features of American Slavery 377 

CHAPTER XXXII. 

The present Anti-Slavery Agitation in America — Its causes, origin, and 
character 382 

CHAPTER XXXIII. 

Opposition to Abolitionists — Its elements — Its nature and methods 400 

CHAPTER XXXIV. 
Attempts to silence the discussion by authority — State Legislatures — 
Federal Executive — U. S. Mails — " Gag" Rules in Congress — 
Right of petition 408 



VI CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER XXXV. page. 
Opposition from leading Clergy and Ecclesiastical bodies 425 

CHAPTER XXXVI. 

n Persecutions of Abolitionists 434 

CHAPTER XXXVII. 
Of the elements and occasions of division among Abolitionists 447 

CHAPTER XXXVIII. 

Divisions in 1839-40 457 

CHAPTER XXXIX. 
Organized political action — Liberty party — Liberty League — Free Soil 

party 468 

CHAPTER XL. 
Anti-Slavery Church agitation — New Anti-Slavery Churches and Mis- 
sionary bodies 487 

CHAPTER XLI. 
The Anti-Slavery Societies — Their relation to political and Church 

action 509 

CHAPTER XLII. 
The American Anti-Slavery Society — Its further course on political 

action 517 

CHAPTER XLIII. 
Second revolution in the position and policy of the American Anti- 
Slavery Society in 1844 526 

CHAPTER XLIV. 
Further difficulties in the American Anti-Slavery Society 529 

CHAPTER XLV. 
Political course of the American Anti-Slavery Society, since its revo- 
lution of 1844 532 

CHAPTER XLVI. 
Course of Mr. Garrison and the American Anti-Slavery Society and 
its members, since the division of 1840, in respect to Anti-Slavery 
Church action 541 

CHAPTER XLVII. 
General estimate of the American Anti-Slavery Society and its labors, 
since 1840 '. 555 



CONTENTS. Vil 

CHAPTER XLVIII. PA e«. 

Review of these divisions and their results 559 

CHAPTER XLIX. 

Different views of the Constitution and of the legality of Slavery 563 

CHAPTER L. 
The Slavery question in America — and the Crisis — What shall be done 1 533 



OBJECT AND PLAN OF THIS BOOK. 



The chief design of this publication is to furnish, in one volume, an 
abstract, for convenient reference, of a great mass of historical informa- 
tion concerning slavery and the struggle against it (in this country and 
Great Britain), that is now to be found only by looking over several volumes, 
numerous pamphlets, and the newspapers and scattered documents of the 
last twenty years. This abstract, at the same time, was intended to have 
a bearing on the now-pending slave question in the United States, and to be 
so selected and arranged, as to facilitate a presentation of that question 
towards the close of the volume. It was designed to be as documentary in 
its character as the nature of an abstract would permit. Hence, it consists 
much in extracts, quotations, and abbreviated paragraphs, preserving as 
much as possible the significant portions, without giving the documents 
entire, which would have required volumes. 

The writer was aware that the attempt to cover so much ground, in one 
volume, was a hazardous one. It could not be a small volume ; and most 
readers, as well as some critics, will instantly pronounce a work " too 
diffuse" that exceeds three or four hundred pages, without stopping to 
consider whether or no it presents the substance of several such volumes on 
distinct points of history. They would find no fault with one book of that 
size that should only tell the story of the abolition of the Afiican slave 
trade, nor with another that should only relate the measures that led to the 
abolition of slavery in the British West Indies, and the results of those 
labors; nor with another that should contain the story of Texas and the 
Mexican war. But if a writer should present the substance of all three 
of these histories, and five or six more in addition, of equal magnitude and 
importance, in a volume of six hundred pages, they would think him u«- 
pardonably diffuse ; and the farther this condensing process was carried, in 
one volume, the more would he fall under censure for diftuseness. The 



X OBJECT AND PLAN, 

difficulty would not end here. The same readers, or others, on referring to 
the parts of the history that most interested them, would fail of obtaining 
all the minute information they expected, or would wonder at the omission 
of many things that they considered important. Whether, on the whole, 
the work will be found too much or too little condensed, is uncertain. If 
the latter, we may hereafter furnish a cheaper abridgment of it : if the 
former, the present edition may hereafter take the name of an abridgment 
to the more copious work that may be written, and for which there are 
ample materials at hand. 

The writer has not wholly excluded from this volume all notice of the 
principles that underlie history, nor of the workings of moral cause and 
effect. Nor has he suppressed his own sentiments, through fear of giving 
offense. He hopes he has not been uncandid or discourteous to others. 

No reasonable pains have been spared to secure accuracy in dates and 
facts ; and yet it is quite impossible to be certain of freedom from errors. 
In some cases, the best authorities disagree. Apparent or real discrepan- 
cies and mistakes are incident to all histories. Biblical critics are not 
always agreed in respect to the true solution of apparent discrepancies in 
the inspired writers of history. In preparing this book, several instances 
have occurred in which good authorities have seemed to make irreconcilable 
statements, but which have, nevertheless, with much labor, been reconciled. 
Few of the books or pamphlets used by us have, been free from real or 
apparent mistakes that have perplexed us. We "hope we shall not be 
accounted careless of our facts, if some of them should be found inaccurate, 
or should be, by somebody, considered so. We trust the book is as free 
from mistakes as most other works of the kind. We are certain of having 
laboriously collected and carefully examined the statements presented, but, 
like others who compile histories, we cannot be held responsible for the mis- 
takes of the best authorities extant. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 



CHAPTER I. 

MAGNITUDE AND NECESSITY OF THE STRUGGLE. 

A World's Question — The Problem of the Present Age. 

The slave question in America is only one phase of the 
more comprehensive question of human freedom that now 
begins to agitate the civilized world, and that presents the 
grand problem of the present age. 

Such a question must be met, must be discussed, must be 
decided, and decided correctly, before the nations of the earth 
can be enfranchised, and before this anomalous republic can 
either secure her own liberties, or find permanent repose. 

In a nation whose declaration of self-evident and inalienable 
human rights has been hailed as the watchword for an univer- 
sal struggle against despotic governments ; — a nation whose 
support of human chattelhood has armed the world's despots 
with their most plausible pleas against republican institutions, 
it is in vain to expect that the discussion of such incongruities 
can be smothered, or the adjustment of them much longer 
postponed. In any age of the world, such expectations would 
be disappointed — in the present age, the indulgence of them 
can be little short of insanity — must be consummate folly. 
The question whether such a nation, at such a period of the 
world's progress, shall continue to tolerate human chattel- 
hood, becomes, of necessity, a world's question. Universal 
human nature is knocking vehemently at our doors, and can- 
not be silenced. As well might we attempt to hush the thun- 

1 



2 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

ders of our own Niagara, or annul the laws by which the 
elements are governed. 

Is this the. language of enthusiasm? Ask counsel of exist- 
ing facts. When a few voices were raised on this subject not 
many years since, the whole community, with few exceptions, 
north and south, demanded that the agitation should cease. 
But has it ceased? Or can it be made to cease? Most for- 
ward and even clamorous in the discussion, are those who, 
even now, have scarcely ceased to proscribe discussion ! Our 
halls of legislation, that were to have been sealed against the 
discussion, nevertheless ring with it, to the exclusion of the 
most favorite topics ! And those who were determined that 
the public mails should not transmit the agitating debate, are 
now gorging those mails to the fall with their own eager de- 
bates ! Not an important public measure can be proposed 
that is not found to involve, in some way, the much dreaded 
but ever present question. Can we not see the hand of an 
all-controlling Providence in all this ? Can we not hear in it 
the voice of Nature and of Nature's God, demanding and 
ordaining a discussion of the slave question? 

The history of Christian civilization is marked with suc- 
cessive eras of advancement, each one of which is distinguished 
by some particular phase or feature of human progress, and 
commonly involves the agitation of some great practical pro- 
blem, the solution of which occupies the minds of thinking 
men until it is definitely settled. This is seldom effected with- 
out long and earnest discussions, sometimes protracted during 
one or two entire generations, and not completed until more 
enlarged views have displaced the prejudices and corrected 
the errors that preceded them. The responsibilities, as well 
as the dangers and the privileges of living in such an age of 
the world— stormy, perhaps, yet progressive — are not com- 
monly appreciated as they should be. Not to have under- 
stood, correctly, the wants, and especially the grand problem 
of such an age, of the age one lives in, not to have taken the 
position, and to have exerted the influence demanded by the 
crisis, were equivalent to having wasted, or worse than wasted, 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 3 

one's probationary existence, so far as its bearing on general 
human progress is concerned; and this, too, at a time when 
one life is to be reckoned of more weight and significance 
than, perhaps, many lives, dreamed away in any of those 
dead calms in this world's history, in which little or nothing 
is done or devised for the elevation of the species. 

Such an age of agitation and of corresponding respon- 
sibility is the present. The grand problem of the age is 
that of a more extended and better defined freedom, espe- 
cially for the very lowest and most degraded portion of the 
species. Ours is an advanced period in the struggle for 
human freedom. It is not to the contest of the barons 
against an unlimited autocrat that we are summoned — nor to 
the struggle of the middle classes against the barons ; nor to 
the question of taxation without representation ; nor to the 
question of religious libert} 7 , for those who are regarded as 
human beings. The demands of liberty strike deeper, now, 
and reach the ground tier of humanity, hid under the rubbish 
of centuries of degradation — classes who have scarcely been 
thought of, as human, and to whom no Magna Charta of 
Runny Meade, no organization of a House of Commons, no 
Declaration of Independence, have brought even a tithe or a 
foretaste of their promised blessings. The houseless, the 
landless, the homeless — the operatives of Manchester and 
Birmingham, the tenantry of Ireland, the Russian serfs, — 
above all, the North AnWrican Slaves — what have Christian 
civilization and democratic liberty and equality in reserve for 
these ? And what are the responsibilities of Christians, of 
philanthropists, of statesmen, and of republican citizens, in 
respect to them ? These questions to be properly decided, 
must be studied, must be understood. 

We single out, for present inquiry, the North American 
slave. Who is he ? What is his condition ? IIow came he 
there ? Who is responsible for his continuance in his present 
condition? What has been done, and what remains to be 
done in respect to him ? 



GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 



CHAPTER II. 
ORIGIN OF THE MODERN SLAVE TRADE AND SLAVERY. 

The Portuguese — The Spaniards — Charles V. — Ferdinand V. — The Hollanders, the 
Danes, the French, the English — Queen Elizabeth, John Hawkins, Louis XIII. of 
France — Act of George II. — Prohibition of Violence — Barbarity of the Traffic — 

Statistics — Imports into Jamaica. 

" la the year 1442, while the Portuguese, under the encouragement of 
their celebrated Prince Henry, were exploring the coast of Africa, Anthony 
Gonzalez, who, two years before, had seized some Moors, near Cape Bada- 
jor, was, by that prince, ordered to carry his prisoners back to Africa. He 
landed them at Rio del Oro, and received from the Moors in exchange, ten 
blacks and a quantity of gold dust, with which he returned to Lisbon." — 
Edwards' 1 History of the West Indies, Vol. II., p. 37. 

" This new kind of commerce, appearing to be a profitable speculation, 
others, of the same nation, soon embarked in it." — Godwin's Lectures on 
Slavery, p. 184. (American Edition.) 

The Spaniards, on taking possession of the West India 
islands, compelled the native Charibs (or Caribs,) to work the 
mines of Hispaniola. In these andf other exhausting labors, 
that feeble race became well nigh extinct,* and their place 
was supplied by importations of a hardier race from Africa. 
The infamy of having first projected this expedient has com- 
monly rested on Las Oasas, a priest much hated among the 
colonists for his uncompromising opposition to the ill treat- 
ment of the Charibs, whom he is represented as seeking to 

* " Down to the dust the Charib people passed, 
Like autumn foliage withering in the blast ; 
A whole race sunk beneath the oppressor's rod, 
And left a blank among the works of God." 

Montgomery's West Indies. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 5 

relieve at the expense of the Africans * "With more proba- 
bility, the crime has been charged on Chievres and the Flemi ft 
nobility, who obtained a monopoly of the traffic from Charles 
V., and sold it for 25,000 ducats to some Genoese merchants, 
who first commenced, in a regular form, the commerce in 
slaves that, with little intermission, has been continued ever 
since. 

" As early as 1503," according to Clarkson, " a few slaves 
were sent by the Portuguese to the Spanish colonics." 

In 1511, Ferdinand V. of Spain, is said to have permitted 
an importation of Negroes into the colonies. But while Car- 
dinal Ximenes held the reins of government, and until the 
accession of Charles V. of Spain, he steadily refused to allow 
such a detestable commerce. Vide Godwin, p. 181. 

It was in 1517 that Charles V., (who was sovereign of Ger- 
manjr, and of the Netherlands,) granted the exclusive patent 
before mentioned, to one or more of the Flemish nobilit}', to 
import four thousand Africans annually, for the supply of 
Hispaniola, Cuba, Jamaica, and Porto Iiico. 

" This great prince was not, in all probability, aware of the dreadful evils 
attending this horrible traffic, nor of the crying injustice of permitting it ; 
for in 1512, when he made a code of laws for his Indian subjects, he liber- 
ated all the Negroes, and by a word put an end to their slavery. When, 
however, he resigned his crown and retiredlnto a monastery, and his minis- 
ter of mercy, Pedro de la Gasca, returned to Spain, the imperious tyrants 
of these new dominions returned to their former practices, and fastened the 
yoke on the suffering and unresisting Negroes." — Godwin, p. 1S5. See ■ 
also Clarkson's History, pp. 28, 29. 

The slave trade was prosecuted by the Portuguese, the 

* Robertson, in his History of America, takes up and somewhat exaggerates 
this statement, on the authority of Herrerd, an enemy of Las Casas, whose charge 
was first published 35 years after the philanthropist's decease. The previous 
writers make no mention of Las Casus in Boch a connection, though avowedly his 
•enemies. The writings of Las Casas abound in denunciations against slavery ; and 
from the language of Ilerrera himself, it would not conclusively appear that Las 
Casas designed to have the Africans imported by compulsion, or held as slaves. — Vide 
the Abbe Gregoire's Defence of Las Casas, approved by James Montgomery in a 
note to his poem, u TIic West Indies.' 1 ' 1 See also Stuart's Memoir of Sharp, page 29 ; 
and preface to Clarlcson's Essay on the Slavery and Commerce of the Human Species. 



6 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

Spaniards, the Hollanders, the Danes, the French, the British, 
the Anglo-Americans, including the colonists of New Eng- 
land. 

BEGINNING OF THE SLAVE TRADE BY THE ENGLISH. 

:t The first importation of Slaves from Africa by Englishmen was in the 
reign of Elizabeth, in the year 1562. This great princess seems, on the 
very commencement of the trade, to have questioned its lawfulness. She 
seems to have entertained a religious scruple concerning it, and, indeed, to 
have revolted at the very thought of it. She seems to have been aware of 
the evils to which its continuance might lead, or that, if it were sanctioned, 
the most unjustifiable means might be made use of, to procure the persons 
of the natives of Africa. And in what light she would have viewed any 
acts of this kind, had they taken place, we may conjecture from this fact ; 
that when Captain (afterwards Sir John) Hawkins returned from his first 
voyage to Africa and Hispaniola, whither he had carried slaves, she sent for 
him, and, as we learn from Hill's Naval History, expressed her concern lest 
any of the Africans should be carried off without their free consent, declar- 
ing that ' it would be detestable, and call down Heaven's vengeance upon 
the undertakers.' Captain Hawkins promised to comply with the injunc- 
tions of Elizabeth in this respect. But he did not keep his word, for when 
he went to Africa again, he seized many of the inhabitants, and carried 
them off as slaves, which occasioned Hill, in the account he gives of his 
second voyage, to use these remarkable words : ' Here began the horrid 
practice of forcing the Africans into slavery, an injustice and barbarity 
which, so sure as there is vengeance in heaven for the worst of crimes, will 
sometime be the destruction of ail who encourage it.' That the trade should 
have been suffered to continue under such a princess, and after such solemn 
expressions as those which she has been described to have uttered, can only 
be attributed to the pains taken by those concerned to keep her ignorant of 
the truth." — Clarkson, p. 30. 

It may be proper to notice the view taken of this beginning 
of the slave trade and slavery in the British dominions by a 
writer decidedly averse to the abolition of the slave trade : 

" In regard to Hawkins, himself, he was, I admit, a murderer and a 
roller. His avowed purpose, in sailing to Guinea, was to take, by strata- 
gem or force, and carry away the unsuspecting natives, in the view of selling 
them as slaves to the people of Hispaniola. In this pursuit, his object was 
present profit, and his employment and pastime devastation and murder." — 
Edwards' History of the West Indies, Vol. II., pp. 43-4. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 7 

This authentic account of the origin of British Colonial 
slavery is worthy of profound study, and, in connection with 
other (acts that maybe presented, suggests thoughts that may 
have a decisive bearing upon the now pending slave question 
in America, in more aspects than one. 

It is common to cast all the odium of slavery upon our 
fathers, and upon the governments that first permitted the 
slave trade. Could the dead rise up and plead their own 
cause, they might perhaps retort that they had no idea of 
lending their sanction to the system of American slavery, as 
now practiced. Queen Elizabeth permitted the Africans to be 
carried into the colonies with their own consent, but they 
were taken and are held by force. Louis XIII. of France 
was very uneasy, when about to sanction the importation of 
Africans into his colonies, until assured that they were to be 
educated in the Christian religion.* What would he say to 
the laws that forbid their Christian education ? And what 
would he think of the statement that the colored people of 
America " must be colonized back to Africa," (a country they 
never saw), before they can be christianized ? 

If one monarch who authorized the importation of Africans 
into his American Colonies directed the liberation of the vic- 
tims when he learned by what means and for what purposes 
they were imported — if another consented to the importation 
only on condition that they should be educated in the Chris- 
tian religion — and if another only permitted their importation 
with their own free consent, (involving, by fair implication, 
the condition of their voluntary and compensated labor,) the 
question may arise whether the importation originally autho- 
rized was indeed that African slave trade that actually took 
place, and which history describes. And this may suggest 
the question how far the usages of slavery, as they now exist, 
can be said to have been authorized or legalized by the per- 
mission of such importations as were contemplated by those 
monarchs. Mr. Clarkson, who seems to have devoted much 
attention to the details of this history, considers them of the 

* Vide Clarkson. 



8 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

utmost importance to a right understanding of the question 
respecting the legality of the slave trade as it existed while 
he was laboring for its suppression. He demands whether 
" the African slave trade ever would have been permitted to 
exist, but for the ignorance of those in authority concerning 
it." And he affirms that the " trade began in piracy, and was 
continued upon the principles of force." (Pg. 31.) 

The connivance, rather than the "ignorance of those in 
authority," appears to have sheltered this execrable traffic, 
after the times of Elizabeth. Even then it was rather toler- 
ated than directly authorized. It would be difficult, perhaps, 
to find any act of the British Parliament by which the slave 
trade was explicitly legalized. The enactments seem to insin- 
uate, or faintly imply, that the negroes imported are property, 
yet they studiously avoid to acknowledge them distinctly, or 
even by necessary implication, as such. In the act of 10 
William III., chap. 26, entitled an "Act to settle the trade to 
Africa," the negroes are not called slaves. In the act of 23 
George II., chap. 31 (1749-50), entitled "An Act for extend- 
ing and improving the trade to Africa," it was provided (sect. 
29) that "no commander or master of any ship trading to 
Africa shall by fraud, force, or violence, or by any other indi- 
rect practice whatsoever, take on board, or carry away from 
the coast of Africa, any negro or native of the said country, 
or commit, or suffer to be committed, any violence on the 
natives, to the prejudice of said trade."* The 28th section 
of the same act did indeed recognize the holding of "slaves" 
at the station of the Trading Company in Africa, yet it gave 
no authority to transport slaves to America or elsewhere. 
Undoubtedly the secret design was to stimulate the slave trade. 
But a sense of shame, and a consciousness of wrong-doing, 
prevented the Parliament from employing the terms which, 
upon a strict legal construction, could give to that feature of 
the African trade the shelter of valid law. [Vide Spooner, 
pp. 29-35.] 

* Mr. Pitt's view of this statute, and of the legality of the slave trade, will bo 
[-resented in the proper place. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 9 

Thus stealthily and almost imperceptibly was the idea of 
legalized human chattclhood introduced. Thus ambiguous 
and tortuous were the enactments under cover of which the 
slave traffic was prosecuted. A graphic and truthful descrip- 
tion of that traffic we present in the language of lion. Horace 
Mann, of Massachusetts.* 

" One wants the plain, sinewy, Saxon tongue, to tell of deeds that should 
have shamed devils. Great Britain was the mother. Her American Colo- 
nies were the daughter. The mother lusted for gold. To get it, she made 
partnership with robbery and death. Shackles, chains, and weapons for 
human butchery, were her outfit in trade. She made Africa her hunting 
ground. She made its people her prey, and the unwilling colonies her mar- 
ket-place. She broke into the Ethiop's home, as a wolf into a sheep-fold 
at midnight, She set the continent aflame, that she might seize the 
affrighted inhabitants as they ran shrieking from their blazing hamlets. 
The aged and the infant she left to the vultures, but the strong men and the 
strong women she drove, scourged and bleeding, to the shore. Packed and 
stowed like merchandise between unventilated decks, so close that the 
tempest without could not ruffle the pestilential air within, the voyage was 
begun. Once a day the hatches were opened, to receive food and disgorge 
the dead. Thousands and thousands of corpses which she plunged into the 
ocean from the decks of her slave ships, she counted only as the tare of her 
commerce. The blue monsters of the deep became familiar with her path- 
way ; and, not more remorseless than she, they shared her plunder. At 
length the accursed vessel reached the foreign shore. And there, the mon- 
sters of the land, fiercer and feller than any that roam the watery plains, 
rewarded the robber by purchasing his spoils. For more than a century did 
the madness of this traffic rage.f During all those years the clock of 
eternity never counted out a minute that did not witness the cruel death by 
treachery or violence of some father or mother of Africa." 

" Mr. Edwards says that from 1700 to 1786, the number imported into 
Jamaica was 610,000. ' I say this,' he observes, 'on sufficient evidence, 
having in my possession lists of all the entries.' ' The total import into 
all the British Colonies from 1680 to 1786 may be put down at 2,130,000.' 
In 1771, which he considers the most flourishing period of the trade, there 
sailed from England to the coast of Africa, one hundred and ninety-two 
ships, provided for the importation of 47,146 negroes. 'And now,' he 
observes, (1793) ' the whole number annually exported from Africa by all 
the European powers, is 74,000, of which 38,000 are imported by the 
British." — Godwin, page 187. 

* Speech in the House of Representatives of the U. S., June 30, 1848. 
+ It has not ceased. It rages with violence still, as will be showu in another 
chapter. 



10 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN" 



CHAPTER III. 

SLAVERY AND THE SLAVE TRADE IN THE BRITISH COLONIES 
IN NORTH AMERICA, NOW THE UNITED STATES. 

Slavers from New England— Slavery in Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, 
Maryland, Virginia, and the Carolinas— Condition of the Slaves— Testimony of 
Wesley and Whitefield— Inquiry into the legal foundation of Colonial Slavery — 
Complaints of the Colonies against the King of Great Britain, for favoring the 
traffic— Paradoxes— Absence of English Statutes legalizing Slavery— Common 
Law— Lord Mansfield— Colonial Charters— Slavery introduced in absence of Colo- 
nial enactments — Date and circumstances of introduction of Slavery into Virginia, 
South Carolina, and Georgia— Prohibition of Slavery in Georgia, (Gen. Ogel- 
thorpe)— Dates of early enactments concerning Slavery in Virginia, N. Carolina, 
S. Carolina, Georgia, and Maryland — Loose and vague character of these enact- 
ments. 

Soon after the settlement of the British North American 
Colonies, Africans were imported into them, and sold and 
held as slaves. Of the extent of these importations we have 
met with no authenticated statistics. The whole number of 
slaves in these states, by the first census under the present 
Constitution, 1790, was 697,697. 

The colonies now known as the Southern or slave states, on 
the Atlantic coast, received the principal share of these im- 
portations. The middle and eastern colonies received com- 
paratively few, and these chiefly for domestic servants in the 
cities, and in the families of professional gentlemen in the 
interior. As the soil was not adapted to slave culture, and 
was owned in small farms by a hardy race of agriculturists, 
inured to habits of labor, the process of cultivation by slaves 
never obtained, particularly in New England, except to a 
very limited extent. In New York, first settled by the Dutch, 
in New Jersey, and perhaps in some portions of Pennsyl* 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 11 

vania, the labor of slaves was introduced to a greater extent 
than further cast. But in the importation of slaves for the 
southern colonics, the merchants of the New England sea- 
ports competed with those of New York and the South. 
They appear, indeed, to have outstripped them, and to have 
almost monopolized, at one time, the immense profits of that 
lucrative but detestable trade. Boston, Salem, and Newbury- 
port, in Massachusetts, and Newport and Bristol in Rhode 
Island, amassed, in the persons of a few of their citizens, vast 
sums of this rapidly acquired and ill gotten wealth, which, 
in many instances, quite as rapidly and very remarkably, took 
to itself wings and flew away. In some cases, however, it 
remained, and formed the basis of the capital of some promi- 
nent mercantile houses, almost or quite down to the present 
time. Citizens, honored with high posts of office in the State 
and Federal Governments, have owed their rank in society, 
and their political elevation, to the wealth thus acquired, 
sometimes thus acquired by themselves, since the colonies be- 
came states, and while the traffic was tolerated as it was, till 
the year 1S08. Among these was a late Senator in Congress, 
from Rhode Island, James D'Wolf, who, at the time, was 
reputed to be the owner of a large slave plantation in Cuba. 
Such incidents may convey some idea of the influence of the 
traffic in New England, even to the present day. ) The former 
seats of the traffic are still the centers of influences hostile to 
the agitation of the slave question. 

The servitude of domestic slaves, in families, is known to 
be less intolerable than that of slaves on plantations. From 
this consideration, and from the limited extent of slavery in 
the northern and eastern colonies, it may be inferred that the 
slavery of that region was of a comparatively mild type. 
And yet we find sufficient evidence of its affinity, in many 
respects, with the present American slave system. f\ Not even 
in Connecticut was there any recognition of the legality and 
validity of a slave's marriage.* A master's inadvertent con- 

* According to Judge Reeve, however, as quoted by Stroud, the murder of a 
slave was held in Connecticut to be the same as the murder of a freeman. The 



12 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

sent to the marriage of his female slave to 'a free colored 
man, was held to be equivalent to her manumission, because 

. master could be sued by the slave for immoderate chastisement ; the slave could 
hold property, in the character of a devisee or legatee, and the master could not 
take away such property, or might be sued for it on behalf of the slave by his next 
friend. — Reeve's Law of Baron and Femme, &c, 340-1 ; Stroud, p. 24. 

In Massachusetts, too, "if the master was guilty of a cruel or unreasonable casti- 
gation of, the slave, he was liable to be punished for a breach of the peace, and, I 
believe, the slave was allowed to demand sureties of the peace against a violent and 
barbarous master." — Opinion of Chief Justice Parsons, case of Winchendon vs. 
Hatfield, Mass. Rep., 127-8, cited by Stroud, p. 23. 

In Massachusetts colony, in 1641, the following law w r as enacted : " It is ordered 
by this court and the authority thereof, that there shall never be any bond slavery, 
villeinage, or captivity among us, unless it be lawful captives taken in just u-ar, 
(such) as willingly sell themselves or are sold to us, and such shall have the liberties 
and Christian usage which the law of God established in Israel concerning such 
persons doth morally require." — See General Laws and Liberties of Massachusetts 
Bay, chap. 12, sect. 2 ; Stroud, p. 23. 

"Whether this act prohibited, or whether it authorized such slavery as afterwards 
actually existed in the colony of Massachusetts, might not be very difficult to deter- 
mine. It certainly prohibited such slavery as now exists at the South. 

There is little doubt that slavery was introduced into Boston, by one Maverick, 
previous to its settlement by George Winthrop and others, in 1630. There is no 
evidence that Maverick was a Puritan. The Boston colonists, generally, were not 
Puritans, and ought never to have been confounded with them by historians. The 
Puritans, with all their defects and errors on this and other subjects, " made a wide 
distinction between those who were stolen and seized by the violence of the slavers, 
and those who" (as they supposed) " had been made captives in a lawful war, or 
were reduced to servitude for their crimes by a judicial sentence." 

This sentiment became current in the New England colonies. " An express law 
was made, prohibiting the buying and selling of the former, while the latter were to 
have the same privileges as were allowed by the laws of Moses." " In November, 
1646, the General Court of Massachusetts passed a law against man-stealing, making 
it a capital crime. They also ordered that two Africans, forcibly brought into the 
colony, should be sent home at the public expense. — \FeWs Annals of Salem.'] 
The other colonies soon passed a law similar to that of Massachusetts. The Con- 
necticut Code, prepared in 1650, has the following section : ' If any man stealcth a 
man or mankinde, he shall be put to death.' The New Haven Code, printed in 
London in 1656, contains a similar article : ' If any person steale a man, or mankind, 
that person shall surely be put to death.' The Plymouth laws probably made man- 
stealing a capital offence." — [See First Annual Report of the New Hampshire Anti- 
Slavery Society, penned by the late John Farmer, Esq., and published in the " Montldy 
Emancipator '," for August, 1S35.] 

In all this we see the stealthy and deceptive introduction of chattel slavery. The 
early laws did not authorize, but prohibited such slavery as was actually introduced 1 
The sin, the shame, and the curse would have been excluded, had it been clearly 
understood that slavery is malum in se. 

The action of the colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, eleven 
years later than that in Massachusetts, was more direct and explicit. The following 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 13 

a slave could not be married, and because a husband could 
claim the assistance of bis wife. 

A still more discreditable illustration was previously fur- 
nished by a rural pastor in the same colony, the owner of 
a male and female slave. Having admitted them both to 
the communion of his church (Congregational) as members, 
and having himself officially pronounced them husband and 
wife, he afterwards separated them forever by the sale of 
the wife to a distant purchaser, in despite of the entreaties 
of both wife and husband. And no court of law, no church, 
no ecclesiastical body interposed, or even censured. 

In Massachusetts, another Congregational pastor, of high 
reputation, is said to have reared up a female slave in his 
family in a state of almost absolute heathenism, and never 
attempted to teach her the alphabet. 

When it is remembered that a large portion of the min- 
isters of religion in New England were amonsr the slave 



document is said to be the first act of any government designed to prevent enslaving 
the negroes. It is copied from the records of the colony : 

" At a general court held at Warwick, the ISth of May, 1652. 

" Whereas, there is a common course practised among Englishmen, to buy ne- 
groes to that end they may have them for service or slaves forever; for the prevent- 
ing of such practices among ns, let it be ordered, That no black mankind or white 
being shall be forced, by covenant, bond, or otherwise, to serve any man or his 
assignees longer than ten years, or until they come to be twenty-four years of ago, 
if they be taken in under fourteen, from the time of their coming within the liber- 
ties of this colony ; at the end or term of ten years to set them free, as the manner 
is with the English servants. And that man that will not let them go free or shall 
sell them away elsewhere, to that end they may be enslaved to others for a longer 
time, he or they shall forfeit to the colony forty pounds." 

To the credit of the members that enacted this law, we subjoin their names from 
the record : 

"The general officers were, John Smith, president; Thomas Olney, general assis- 
tant, from Providence ; Samuel Gorton, from Warwick ; John Green, general re- 
corder ; Randal Ilolden, treasurer; Hugh Bewett, general sergeant. 

" The commissioners were from Providence — Robert Williams, Gregory Dexter, 
Richard Waterman, Thomas-Harris, William Wickcndcn, and Hugh Bewett; from 
Warwick— Samuel Gorton, John Wickes, John Smith, Randal Ilolden, John Green, 
jr., and Ezckiel Holliman." 

The prevalence of slavery and the briskness of the slave trade in Rhode Island, 
long after the enactment of this law (which does not appear to have ever been 
repealed), furnishes another illustration of the fact that slavery grew up in the 
colonies in violation of law. 



14 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

holding class of the community during the colonial state of 
the country, and many of them still later, that this was 
within fifty or sixty years of the beginning of the anti- 
slavery agitation in 1832, and that many of the present min- 
isters of New England are the sons and most of them the 
successors, of slave holding ministers, it cannot reasonably 
be doubted that that untoward circumstance has had a bear- 
ing upon the position of the present generation of ministers 
in New England, in respect to the agitation of the subject, 
and especially in respect to the doctrine of the inherent 
sinfulness of slave holding. A similar remark might be made, 
with perhaps greater force, in respect to New Jerse} r , and, 
to a greater or less extent, in respect to a great part of the 
middle states. The beginning of the present agitation, in 
fact, found slavery existing, to a considerable extent, in New 
Jersey, and the influence of that fact has been seen and felt, 
wherever the slave question has been discussed, in this 
country.* 

Slavery in the now Atlantic slave states received, substan- 
tially, its present complexion during the colonial period. The 
most important enactments on the subject bear date previous 
to the Declaration of Independence. 

John Wesley, who visited this country during this period, 
characterizes " American slavery " as " the vilest that ever 
saw the sun." 

George Whitefield, who travelled and preached extensively 
in the colonies, has drawn a vivid picture of the treatment of 
slaves at that period. This testimony, it should be remem- 
bered, is that of a devout man, whose type of piety is not 
exposed to the suspicion of tending to magnify, unduly, (as 
some are supposed to do) the physical privations and suffer- 
ings of slaves. Nor was he misled into any exaggeration by 
having imbibed the sentiment of the inherent and necessary 
criminality of slaveholding. Such a testimony is too important 

* The Biblical defences of slaveholding, sent forth from the seat of the Theologi- 
cal Seminary at Princeton, took the lead of any thing of that description originating 
farther South. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 15 

to be omitted in this place. In a " Letter to the inhabi- 
tants of Maryland, Virginia, North and South Carolina," in 
1739, he writes as follows: 

" As I lately passed through your provinces on my way hither, I was 
sensibly touched with a fellow-feeling for the miseries of the poor negroes. 
Whether it he lawful for Christians to buy slaves, and thereby encourage 
the nations from whom they are bought to be at perpetual war with each 
other, I shall not take upon me to determine. Sure I am it is sinful, when 
they have bought them, to use them as bad as though they ucrc brutes, nay 
worse ; and whatever particular exceptions there may be (as I would chari- 
tably hope there are some), I fear the generality of you, who own negroes, 
are liable to such a charge ; for your slaves, I believe, work as hard, if not 
harder, than the horses whereon you ride. These, after they have done 
their work, are fed, and taken proper care of; but many negroes, when 
wearied with labor in your plantations, have been obliged to grind their 
corn, after their return home. Your dogs are caressed and fondled at your 
table, but your slaves, who are frequently styled dogs or beasts, have not 
an equal privilege. They are scarce permitted to pick up the crumbs 
which fill from their master's table. Not to mention what numbers have 
been given up to the inhuman usage of task-masters, who, by their unre- 
lenting scourges, have plowed their backs, and made long furrows, and, at 
length, brought them even unto death. When passing along, I have viewed 
your plantations cleared and cultivated, many spacious houses built, and the 
owners of them faring sumptuously every day, 'my blood has frequently 
almost run cold within me, to consider how many of your slaves had neither 
convenient food to eat, nor proper raiment to put on, notwithstanding most 
of the comforts you enjoy were solely owing to their indefatigable labors." 

In tracing the origin, progress, and history of American 
slavery, now claiming the high sanction and sacred guaranties 
of our Constitution and laws, and wielding both state and 
national governments for its support, it is important to note 
down with distinctness and precision all those facts of the 
history that may serve to throw any light upon the rise and 
growth of those high claims, and the methods that have been 
employed to swell them into their present magnitude, to give 
them their present hold upon the public mind, and upon 
the politics, the legislation, and the jurisprudence of the 
country. 

Equally interesting will it be to trace, if we can, the process 
by which the murderous and piratical depredations of John 



16 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

Hawkins, upon the unoffending inhabitants of Africa, scarcely 
three centuries ago, have been made to give not only legal 
validity, but biblical authority and sanction to the imbruting 
of three millions of native-born Americans, of all hues, the 
descendants of all the nations of Europe, as well as of the 
African tribes. 

We pause, therefore, to inquire on what authority, divine or 
human, the North American colonies of Great Britain were 
inundated with a population of slaves? Was it the prece- 
dent of Gonzalez, the alleged recommendation of Las Casas, 
the importunate rapacity of Chievres, the permission of Fer- 
dinand, the patent of Charles V., that gave legality to these 
proceedings? Was it the guarded and hesitant assent of 
Queen Elizabeth? Was it the treachery and perjury of Haw- 
kins ? Was it the ambiguity of the Act of Parliament " for 
extending and improving the trade to Africa," but forbidding 
"any violence to the natives," and imposing a petty fine upon 
any commander who, " by fraud, force, or violence, or any 
other indirect practice whatsoever," should "take on board 
or carry away from the coast of Africa, any Negro, or native 
of said country ?" 

And what was done by the colonial authorities to authorize 
the traffic? 

" The New England colonies, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Virginia, pre- 
sented to the throne the most humble and suppliant petitions, praying for the 
abolition of the trade. The colonial legislatures passed laws against it. 
But their petitions were spurned from the throne. Their laws were vetoed 
by their Governors." — Hon. Horace Mann. Speech in Congress, June 30, 
1848. 

In the original draft of the Declaration of Independence, by 
Mr. Jefferson, this charge against the King of Great Britain is 
thus stated : 

" He has waged cruel war against human nature itself, violating its most 
sacred rights of life and liberty, in the persons of a distant people who 
never offended him, captivating and carrying them into slavery in another 
hemisphere, or to incur miserable death in their transportation thither. This 
piratical warfare, the opprobrium of infidel powers, is the warfare of the 
Christian king of Great Britain. Determined to keep a market where men 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 17 

should be bought and sold, he has at length prostituted his negative for sup- 
pressing any legislative attempt to prohibit and restrain this execrable 
commerce." 

This paragraph was objected to by the delegation from 
Georgia, and it was accordingly expunged from the docu- 
ment. 

A bundle of incongruities here present themselves, attesting 
the monstrous and anomalous character of the usages in ques- 
tion. The British Government, that had never dared, in the 
face of British Common Law, to attempt legalizing, directly 
and unequivocally, the slave traffic, interposed, it would seem, 
to prevent the colonies from suppressing it. The colonies 
that, (as will be shown,) had transcended and even outraged 
their constitutional charters by their iniquitous slave code, 
are found petitioning and attempting to legislate against the 
slave trade I Slave-holding republicans stigmatizing a mon- 
arch as a tyrant because he had permitted them to be supplied 
with the subjects of their own tyranny! A revolutionary 
Congress compelled or consenting to strike out the most 
weightv item in the list of offences that characterized their 
repudiated king as a tyrant ! 

Whatever solution may be made of such paradoxes, or 
whatever may be inferred from them, they furnish a slippery 
and intricate labyrinth for slave-holders in search of their 
sacred and vested rights, the legal sanctions and the constitu- 
tional guaranties of their peculiar immunities, the very founda- 
tions of which were laid in piracy and crime. 

Thus much in respect to the colonial slave trade, the founda- 
tion of colonial slavery. We inquire next respecting such 
facts of history, whatever they may be, as shall afford informa- 
tion concerning the authority, either divine or human, by 
which the colonists held slaves, and the colonial legislatures, 
(that attempted the suppression of the slave trade as criminal,) 
enacted their slave laws. 

We are entering, here, upon no process of argument. We 
are only recording indisputable facts, without which our his- 
torical sketches would be unfaithful and incomplete. Wo 

2 



18 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

know of nothing so sacred in the claims of slavery as could 
warrant the suppression of important historical facts. 

One of those facts is, that there were no English statute 
laws, prior to the American Revolution, authorizing the hold- 
ing of slaves, either in England or in the American colonies. 
None such, at least that we know of, have ever been alleged 
to exist. 

Another fact is, that the common law of England was in- 
compatible with, slavery, and neither recognized nor permit- 
ted its existence. 

Another fact is, that in the year 1772, the Court of King's 
Bench, Lord Mansfield presiding, affirmed, in respect to Eng- 
land, the legal facts above stated, and decided that there 
neither then was, nor ever had been, any legal slavery in 
England. 

Another fact is, that the colonial charters, authorizing the 
colonial Legislatures to enact laws, gave no license to slavery, 
and contained the general proviso, that the laws of the colo- 
nies should " not be repugnant or contrary, but as nearly as 
circumstances would allow, conformable to the laws, statutes, 
and rights of our kingdom of England."* 

Another fact is, that when slavery was first introduced into 
the Anglo-American colonies, and for some time afterwards, 
there were no colonial enactments that authorized the holding 
of slaves, or defined the relation and condition of slavery. 
The practice of slave-holding grew up and was tolerated with- 
out law, till at length it acquired power to control legislation 
and wield it in favor of slavery. 

Another fact is, that when enactments were passed upon 
the subject, they assumed the existence of slavery, without so 
denning who were or might be slaves, as to enable any slave- 
master at the present day to prove that his slaves are held in 
virtue of any of the colonial enactments. 

Another fact is, that the authority of the colonial " charters, 

* The charters of Virginia, Maryland, the Oarolinas, and Georgia, as veil as of 
Pennsylvania and the New England colonies, were essentially alike in this particular. 
— Spdoner, p. 24. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 10 

during their continuance, and the general authority of the 
common law, prior to the Revolution, have been recognized 
by the Supreme Court of the United States."* 

These important historical facts should be borne in mind, 
pondered, and used, when there is occasion for them, by all 
who wish to oppose slavery, or to understand the relation of 
slave-holding to the laws and institutions of the country. 

The landing of the founders of New England, at Plymouth, 
was in 1620. The first settlement in Virginia, at Jamestown, 
was in 1607. The charter to Lord Baltimore, of Maryland, 
was granted in 1632. The charter to William Penn, of Penn- 
sylvania, in 1681. North Carolina began to be settled about 
1650. South Carolina, about 1670, and Georgia in 1733. 

. Virginia was the first of the colonies that introduced slavery. 
Such an event was a natural consequence of the character and 
position of the first inhabitants. 

" Of the one hundred and five persons on the list of emigrants destined to 
remain, there were no men with families, — there were but twelve laborers, 
and very few mechanics. The rest were composed of gentlemen of fortune, 
and of persons of no occupation, — mostly of idle and dissolute habits — who had 
been tempted to join the expedition through curiosity or the hope of gain ; a 
company but poorly calculated to plant an agricultural State in a wilder- 
ness." — Willson's Am. Hist. p. 162. 

New emigrants arrived in 1609, " most of whom were profligate and 
disorderly persons, who had been sent off to escape a worse destiny at 
home." — lb. p. 166. 

" In the month of August, 1620, a Dutch man-of-war entered James River 
and landed twenty negroes for sale. This was the commencement of negro 
slavery in the colonies." — lb. p. 169. 

At this time "there were very few women in the colony" — "Ninety 
women of reputable character" were soon after sent over, and the colonists 
purchased them for wives, "the price of a wife rising from one hundred and 
twenty to one hundred and fifty pounds of tobacco." — lb. p. 170. 

Though these were not held as slaves, yet the state of soci- 
ety indicated by these historical incidents, illustrate the moral 
and social position of the colonists, at the time they com- 

* 9 CrancVs V. S. Beports, 332-3, as quoted in " The Unconstitutionaliti/ of 
Slavery, bp Lysander Spooner" pp. 25-G. 



20 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN" 

rnenced the practice of slave-holding. And, so far as law was 
concerned, there was no more legal authority or sanction, at 
that time, in Virginia, for the holding of negroes in slavery, 
than there was for making slaves of the white women they 
purchased. And the incident of purchasing wives shows that 
the mere act of purchasing human beings (of which mention 
is made in the Scriptures,) does not, of necessity, involve the 
ideas of chattelhood, or of forced servitude: no, not even in Vir- 
ginia!* J 

About the year 1671, Sir John Yeamans was appointed governor of South 
Carolina. " From Barbadoes he brought a number of African slaves, and 
South Carolina was, from the first, essentially, a planting State, with slave 
labor." — Willsoii's Am. Hist. p. 256. 

The first settlement of Georgia was commenced under au- 
spices decidedly hostile to slavery. Gen. James Oglethorpe, 
a member of the British Parliament, " conceived the idea of 
opening for the poor of his own country, and for the perse- 
cuted protestants of all nations, an asylum in America." 
Having obtained a grant from the king, he landed at Savan- 
nah with 120 emigrants, and commenced his settlement in 
1733. The Trustees strictly prohibited slavery, and "de- 

V * Another fact, illustrative of the social and moral influences under which slavery 
grew up and entrenched itself in Virginia, deserves notice. 

The following were the views of Sir William Berkeley, a royal Governor of 
Virginia, on the subject of popular education. In a letter descriptive of the state 
of that province, some years after the Restoration, he says : 

"I thank God there are no free schools nor printing, and I hope we shall not 
have, these hundred years ; for learning has brought heresy and disobedience and 
sects into the world, and printing divulges them, and commits libels against the 
government. God keep us from both I" 

This must have been since the year 1660, the era of the " Restoration" of Charles 
II., or nearly half a century after the lawless introduction of slavery into the colony. 
And it is among the archives of this dark period of Virginian brutality, sensualism, 
ignorance, lawlessness, despotism, servility, and semi- barbarism — in a community 
without wives, or with wives purchased like negroes with tobacco, without printing 
presses or free schools for more than half a century, and no prospect of them in 
future— here it is that our learned civilians and erudite theologians, in gowns and 
spectacles, are reverently searching for the credentials of the "peculiar institution," 
with its sacred legal rights and Bible guaranties ! Worthy successors of Sir Wil- 
liam Berkeley ! Accomplished expounders of his law, and of his gospel ! — " God 
lceep us from loth /" 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 21 

clared it to be not only immoral, bat contrary to the laws of 
England"— Wilkon's Am. Hist, p. 262. 

Unhappily — " Most of those who first came over were unaccustomed to 
habits of labor. 1 ' (lb. 262.) " The Colony did not prosper," and some of the 
colonists began to " complain that they were prohibited the use of slave- 
labor. 

" The regulations of the trustees began to be evaded, and the laws against 
shivery were not rigidly enforced. At first, slaves from South Carolina 
were hired for short periods; then, for a hundred years, or during life, and a 
Bum equal to the value of the negro paid in advance ; and finally, slavers for 
Africa sailed directly from Savannah ; and Georgia, like Carolina, became 
a planting State, with slave-labor." — Willson's Am. Hist. p. 265. 

" In 1752, the trustees of Georgia, wearied with complaints against the 
system of government which they had established, and finding that the 
Colony languished under their care, resigned their charter to the king," 
&c.—Ib. p. 266. 

The historical evidence is here complete, that slavery and 
the slave trade were introduced into Georgia, not only without 
the sanction of either British or Colonial law, but in manifest 
and flagrant violation of both. 

Gen. Oglethorpe, defeated in his laudable efforts, returned 
to England, in 1743. He afterwards became the friend and 
co-adjutor of Granville Sharp, and wrote against slavery, 
and the impressment of seamen. Under date of Cranharn 
Hall, 13th October, 1776, he wrote to Mr. Sharp the follow- 
ing particulars respecting his former connection with the 
colony of Georgia: 

" My friends and I settled the Colony of Georgia, and by charter were 
established trustees, to make laws, &c. We determined not to suffer slacery 
there. But the slave merchants and their adherents occasioned us not only 
much trouble, but at last got the then government to favor them. We would 
not suffer slavery, (which is against the Gospel, as well as the fundamental 
law of England) to be authorized under our authority ; we refused, as trus- 
tees, to make a law permitting such a horrid crime. The government, find- 
ing the trustees resolved firmly not to concur with what they believed un- 
just, took away the charter by which no law could be passed .without our 
consent." — Stuart's Memoir of Sharp, p. 25. 

The particulars which follow demand careful attention. 
In Virginia, " slavery was introduced in 1620, but no act 



22 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

was passed even purporting to tell who might be slaves, until 
1670"— and this act was afterwards found so defective in the 
description, as to need a new act for the purpose in 1748, 
one hundred and twenty-eight years after slavery had been 
introduced.— Spooner's " Unconstitutionality of Slavery, pp. 
38-9. 

" In North Carolina, no general law at all was passed, prior to the revo- 
lution, declaring who might be slaves." (See Iredell's Statutes, revised by 
Martin). — Spooncr p. 40. 

" In South Carolina the only statutes, prior to the revolution, that at- 
tempted to designate the slaves, was passed in 1740— after slavery had a 
long time" (sixty-nine years) " existed. And even this statute, in reality 
defined nothing, for the whole purport of it was to declare that all negroes, 
Indians, mulattoes, and mestizoes, except those who were then free, should 
be slaves." — Spooner, p. 40. 

But no previous law had told who were then legally slaves, 
nor who were legally free I 

" The same law, in nearly the same words, was passed in Georgia, in 
1770," more than a quarter of a century after the introduction of slavery, 
and after the commencement and brisk prosecution of the African slave 
trade." — Vide Spooner, pp. 40, M—Willsori's History, <3fc. 

The " earliest law " of Maryland, noticed by Judge Stroud, 
denning who might be held as slaves, was enacted in 1663, 
thirty-one years after the settlement of the colony. The lan- 
guage of the statute assumes the previous fact of slaveholding, 
and alludes also to a still more remarkable fact. 

" Divers free-born ^English women, forgetful of their free condition, and 
to the disgrace of our Ration, do intermarry with negro slaves; by which, 
also, divers suits may Irise, touching the issue of such women, and great 
damage doth befall thejnaster of such negroes," &c. J 

To deter from such matches, the statute enacts as follows : 

" Whatsoever free-born woman shall intermarry with any slave, shall 
serve the master of such slave during the life of her husband, and that all the 
issue of such free born women, so married, shall be slaves, as their fathers 
were." — Stroud's Sketch of the Slave Laws, p. 10. 

This last provision was a departure from the prevalent 
maxim of the slave code, that the child follows the condition 



BL4VEEY AND FREEDOM. 23 

of the mother. The temporary end of the statute of 1663 
having been answered, it was repealed in 1681, with a clause 
saving the rights under the act of 1663, so that the mas- 
ters might continue to hold in slavery the descendants, if 
any, of the " free born English women " who • might have 
married slaves, during the operation of the act of 1663, 
which was repealed " to prevent persons from purchasing- 
white women as servants, and marrying them to their slaves, 
for the purpose of making slaves of them and their offspring.'^) 

Yet ■' the doctrine of ' partus sequitur 1 obtained in the province" (i. e. the 
children of slaves followed the condition of the father) '' till the year 1699 
or 1700, when a general revision of the laws took place, and the acts in 
which this doctrine was recognized were, with many others, repealed. An 
interval of about fifteen years appears to have elapsed, without any written 
law on this subject; but in 1715 (chapj'44, sec. 22) the following one was 
passed: "All negroes and slaves already imported, or hereafter to be im- 
ported into this province, and all children now born or hereafter to be born 
of such negroes and slaves, shall be slaves during their natural lives.' Thus, 
(continues Stroud) was the maxim of the civil law, ' partus sequitur ventreni 1 
introduced, and the condition of the mother, from that day to the present 
time, has continued to determine the fate of the child." — Stroud's Sketch. 
pp. 10, 11. 

Had the opposite maxim prevailed — had the child fol- 
lowed the condition of the father, there would have been 
comparatively few slaves in Maryland, or in any of the 
southern states, at the present time. 

The dates of colonial enactments on the subject of slavery 
are important historical items, as already hinted, because 
they are necessary in order to establish the fact of legalized 
colonial slavery, and to fix the period of its commencement, 
in a given colony, (if any such legislation under the Colonial 
Charters already alluded to, can be supposed to have been 
valid.) And we have already noticed that the practice of 
slavehohding obtained in the principal slave colonies, for long 
periods, and, in one instance, up to the period of the Ameri- 
can Revolution, without any action of the colonial authorities 
attempting to tell who were slaves ; viz. in Virginia, 50 years; 
in South Carolina, 69 years ; in Georgia, more than 25 years; 



24 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

in Maryland, (from its first settlement), 31 } 7 ears; and in 
North Carolina there was no colonial definition at all! 

But the dates and the various provisions of the several 
colonial enactments, admitting them to have been constitu- 
tionally valid, become important historical facts in another 
point of view, not only as bearing upon the inquiry, Who 
were, legally, slaves, but also on the question, What was the 
slavery under which they were thus legally held, and When 
was it, that that slavery, as thus legislatively defined, became 
legalized ? 

For, if it were clearly ascertained and established, that 
"slavery," in general terms, had been legalized by valid 
and constitutional enactments of the colonial legislatures, in 
the first commencement of their authority, the question would 
still remain whether the slavery thus legalized was identical 
with the slavery defined many years afterwards, or whether 
it was altogether another thing, though known by the same 
name. The South Carolina enactment of 1740, and the 
Georgia enactment of 1770, would tell us, distinctly enough, 
what was the slavery of those colonies at those periods : but 
they could not tell us whether the slavery legalized in those 
colonies (if, indeed, there were any) sixty-nine, and twenty- 
five years previous, was precisely the same thing. It might 
have been only the bond-service of Massachusetts, in 1641, 
defined by " the law of God established in Israel," and which, 
if followed out, would have secured " a jubilee throughout the 
land, to all the inhabitants thereof," long ago. In Georgia, as 
we have seen, the first slavery was the hiring of slaves for 
short periods, then for one hundred years — then buying, then 
importing them, and thus the whole system was changed. 

When we are told of the inherited, imprescriptible, time- 
sanctioned, and guarantied rights of the present American 
slaveholder, it becomes a matter of the deepest interest to 
learn, if we may, the origin, the date, the tenure, and the 
description of those rights, as originally defined. Between the 
right to import Africans into the colonies, with " their own 
free consent" in the times of Queen Elizabeth or James L, 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 25 

and the right to hold the descendants of those Africans, and 
of all the nations of Europe, as chattels personal, in the pres- 
ent American States, there seems a perceptible chasm, and 
before the latter can be inferred from the former, some atten- 
tion must needs be paid to the various arches of the bridge 
by which this chasm is conceived to have been spanned. A 
few missing links and bolts might endanger the safety of the 
transition. Into the requisite examination we cannot now 
enter. We only indicate the field of inquiry, and note down 
a few obvious facts. 

In consulting Stroud's Sketch of the Slave Laws, one is 
struck with the fact that most, if not all of the colonial enact- 
ments cited, bear date many years after the practice of slave- 
holding is known to have been introduced, and after the slaves 
must have become numerous. From this fact, and from the 
implications or statements in the preambles to those acts, it 
appears evident that the usages of slavery grew up first, and 
that the colonial legislation came in, to sanction and shelter 
them, afterwards, indicating the fact of a previously existing 
slavery without statute, and consequently illegal, since no 
one maintains that it could have originated in natural right, 
or in the principles' of common law. 

Thus, in Virginia, where slavery, in fact, commenced in 
1620, the first slave law cited by Stroud or by Spooner, is 
that of 1670, and most of the acts defining slavery are, per- 
haps, since 1700. — Of the slave laws of Maryland, (which was 
settled in 1632,) the first cited is that of 1663, and the remain- 
der are from 1715 to 1751. — Of those of South Carolina, 
where slavery commenced in 1671, the first cited bears date 
1695, — the remainder from 1711 to 1740, at which latter date 
the "peculiar institution" evidently received, (so far as the 
statute is concerned,) its full proportions and shape. — Of those 
of North Carolina, settled about 1650, the first cited is that 
of 1729, and the remainder bear date from 1741 to 1743, about 
which time the definition of slavery appears to have been 
settled, upon very nearly its present basis, in that Colony. — 
Of those of Georgia, where slavery commenced prior to 1743, 



26 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

the first and only distinct reference is to the law of 1770, by 
which, very manifestly, the cardinal features of the slave law, 
in that Colony, were determined. — These eras in colonial slave 
legislation are too distinctly marked to be mistaken or forgot- 
ten by the student of American slave law; though, doubtless, 
there must have been some earlier acts, not noticed by Judge 
Stroud, and some of his references are to Digests and Manuals, 
in which the dates of legislation are not given. 

Slave legislation, since the American Eevolution, has made 
some important strides. Virginian slavery reposes on her 
revised code of 1819, and is what that makes it, without dream- 
ing of any hazard to the venerable antiquity of her claims. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 27 



CHAPTEB IV. 

EARLY TESTIMONIES AGAINST SLAVERY AND THE SLAVE 

TRADE. 

The Dominicans in Spanish America, as related by Clarlcson, " consid- 
ered slavery as utterly repugnant to the principles of the gospel, and recom- 
mended the abolition of it." Being opposed by the Franciscans, " a 
controversy on the subject between them was carried to Pope Leo X. for 
his decision." 

Pope Leo X. declared that " not only the Christian religion, but that 
nature herself cried out against slavery." 

Charles V. (as before stated) bore testimony against slavery, by abolish- 
ing it in his dominions, in the year 1512. 

Between A. D. 1670 and 1680, Godwyn, a clergyman of the Established 
Church, and Richard Baxter, the celebrated Non-conformist, bore strong 
testimony against these oppressions, the former, describing, with nervous 
eloquence, the brutality of slavery, as he had witnessed it in Barbadoes ; — 
the latter protesting against the traffic, and denouncing those engaged in it as 
pirates and robbers. These writers were followed by Southern, Hutcheson, 
Foster, Atkins, Wallis, and others. [Vide Clarkson.] 

Bishop Warburton, in 1676, preached a sermon, denouncing, in strong 
language, those who "talk, as of herds of cattle, of property in rational 
creatures !" 

Dr. Porteus, Bishop of London, said that the slave trade was contrary to 
the religion we professed. He vindicated the Bible against the assertion 
that it sanctioned slavery — "Nay," (said he) "it classed men-stealers or 
slave traders among the murderers of fathers and mothers, and the most 
profane criminals on earth." 

John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, who had witnessed the workings 
of slavery in our North American colonies and in the West Indies, declared 
" American slavery" to be " the vilest that ever saw the sun," and consti- 
tuting " the sum of all villanies." Slave dealers, he denominated " man 
stealers ; the worst of thieves, in comparison of whom high-way robbers 



28 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

and house-breakers are comparatively innocent." He adds : " And men 
buyers are exactly on a level with men stealers." 

Jonathan Edwards, the younger, said : " To hold a man in a state of 
slavery, is to be, every day, guilty of robbing him of his liberty, or of man 
stealing." 

Bishop llorsley said : " Slavery is injustice, which no consideration of 
policy can extenuate." 

Dr. Samuel Johnson said : " No man is by nature the property of another. 
The rights of nature must be some way forfeited before they can justly be 
taken away." 

Edmund Burke said : " Slavery is a state so improper, so degrading, and 
so ruinous to the feelings and capacities of human natirfe, that it ought not 
to be suffered to exist." 

Archdeacon Paley said : " Slavery is a dominion and system of laws, the 
most merciless and tyrannical that were ever tolerated upon the face of the 
earth." 

Montesquieu ironically said : " If we allow negroes to be men, it will 
begin to be believed that we, ourselves, are not Christians !" 

Blackstone, the jurist, sums up an elaborate scrutiny of the subject thus : 
" If neither captivity nor contract can, by the plain law of nature and 
reason, reduce the parent to a state of slavery, much less can they reduce 
the offspring." 

William Pitt declared it to be " injustice to permit slavery to remain for 
a single hour." 

Charles James Fox said : " With regard to a regulation of slavery, my 
detestation of its existence induces me to know no such thing as a regula- 
tion of robbery, and a restriction' of murder." "Personal freedom is a 
right of which he who deprives a fellow-creature is criminal in so depriving 
him, and he who withholds is no less criminal in withholding." 

Bishop Butler said : " Despicable as they" (the negroes) " may appear in 
our eyes, they are the creatures of God, and of the race of mankind, for 
whom Christ died, and it is inexcusable to keep them in ignorance of the 
end for which they were made, and of the means whereby they may be- 
come partakers of the general redemption." 

Hannah More said : " Slavery is vindicated in print (1788), and defended 
in the House of Peers ! Poor human reason ! When wilt thou come to 
years of discretion?" 

Dr. Samuel Hopkins said : " Slavery is, in every instance, wrong, un- 
righteous, oppressive, a very great and crying sin, there being nothing of 
the kind equal to it on the face of the earth." 

The learned Grotius said : " Those are men stealers who abduct, keep, 
sell or buy slaves or free men. To steal a man is the highest kind of 
theft." 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 29 

Dr. Benjamin Rush said : " Domestic slavery is repugnant to the prin- 
ciples of Christianity." " It is rebellion against the authority of a common 
Father." 

Dr. Primatt said : "It has pleased God to cover some men with white 
skins and others with black ; but as there is neither merit nor demerit in 
complexion, the white man, notwitbstanding the barbarity of .custom and 
prejudice, can have no right, by virtue of his color, to enslave and tyran- 
nize over the black man." 

Dr. William Robertson said : " No inequality, no superiority in power, 
no pretext of consent, can justify this ignominious depression of human 
nature." 

The Abbe Gregoire said : " The corruption of our times carries towards 
posterity all the elements of slavery and crime." " There is not a vice, 
not a species of wickedness, of which Europe is not guilty towards ne- 
groes, of which she has not shown them the example."' 

The Abbe Raynal said : " He who supports slavery is the enemy of the 
human race. He divides it into two societies of legal assassins, the op- 
pressors and the oppressed." " I shall not be afraid to cite to the tribunal 
of reason and justice those governments which tolerate this cruelty, or 
which even are not ashamed to make it the basis of their power/' 

Dr. Price, of London, said : " If you have a right to make another man 
a slave, he has a right to make you a slave." 

Joseph Addison said : " What color of excuse can there be for the con- 
tempt with which we treat this part of our species" (the negroes), " that-we 
should not put them upon the common footing of humanity'?" — Vide Spec- 
tator. 

Dr. Adam Clarke, the learned commentator, said : " How can any nation 
pretend to fast, or worship God, or dare profess to believe in the existence 
of such a being, while they carry on what is called the slave trade, and 
traffic in the souls, blood, and bodies of men 1 O ye most flagitious of 
knaves, and worst of hypocrites ! Cast off at once the mask of religion, 
and deepen not your endless perdition by professing the faith of our Lord 
Jesus Christ, while you continue in this traffic." — Comment. onJsa.,58 : G. 

Macknight, the commentator, in exposition of 1 Tim. 1 : 10, said : " Men 
stealers are inserted among the daring criminals against whom the law of 
God directed its awful curses. These were persons who kidnapped men 
to sell them for slaves ; and this practice seems inseparable from tbe other 
iniquities and oppressions of slavery ; nor can a slave dealer easily keep 
free from this criminality, if indeed the receiver is as bad as the thief." 

Thomas Scott, the commentator, copied the preceding from Macknight, 
and in his practical observations on Rev. 18 : 13 — " Souls of men" — said : 
"• To number the persons of men with beasts, sheep, and horses, as the 
stock of a farm, or with bales of goods, as the cargo of a ship, is, no doubt, 
a most detestable and anti-Christian practice." 



30 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

Abraham Booth, (the Baptist theological writer) said : " I have not a 
stronger conviction of scarcely anything, than that slave holding (except 
when the slave has forfeited his liberty by crimes against society) is wicked 
and inconsistent with Christian character." " To me it is evident, that who- 
ever would purchase an innocent black man to make him a slave, would 
with equal readiness purchase a white one for the same purpose, could he 
do it with equal impunity, and no more disgrace." 

Mr. Booth preached a sermon (1792) entitled " Commerce in the 
Human Species, and the enslaving of innocent persons, inimical to the laws^ 
of Moses, and the Gospel of Christ." The text was from Exodus 21 : 16. 
" He that stealeth a man, and selleth him, or if he be found in his hands, he 
shall surely be put to death." 

James Beattie said : " Slavery is inconsistent with the dearest and most 
essential rights of man's nature ; it is detrimental to virtue and industry ; it 
hardens the heart to those tender sympathies which form the most lovely 
part of human character ; it involves the innocent in hopeless misery, in 
orcier to procure wealth and pleasure for the authors of that misery ; it seeks 
to degrade into brutes, beings whom the Lord of Heaven and Earth endowed 
with rational souls, and created for immortality ; in short, it is utterly re- 
pugnant to every principle of reason, religion, humanity, and conscience. 
It is impossible for a considerate and unprejudiced mind, to think of slavery 
without horror." 

George Fox, when in Barbadoes, in 1671, addressed himself thus, to those 
who attended his religious meetings : " Consider with yourselves, if you 
were in the same condition as the poor Africans are, who came strangers to 
you, and were sold to you as slaves ; I say, if this should be the condition 
of you or yours, you would think it a hard measure ; yea, and very great 
bondage and cruelty." 

John Locke said : " Slavery is so vile, so miserable an estate of man, 
and so directly opposite to the generous temper and courage of our nation, 
that it is hard to be conceived that an Englishman, much less a gentleman, 
should plead for it." — Essay on Government. 

Thomas Jefferson said : " The whole commerce between master and 
slave, is a perpetual exercise of the most boisterous passions ; the most un- 
remitting despotisms, on the one part, and degrading submissions on the 
other." " I tremble for my country, when I reflect, thai God is just ; that 
his justice cannot sleep forever." — Notes on Virginia. 

John Jay said : " Till America comes into this measure'' 1 (abolition) " her 
prayers to Heaven will be impious. This is a strong expression, but it is 
just." " I believe that God governs the world, and I believe it to be a 
maxim in His. as in our courts, that those who ask for equity ought to do it.' 
— Letter from Spain, 1780. 

Dr. Benjamin Franklin said : " Slavery is an atrocious debasement of 
human nature." 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 31 

James Oglethorpe, tlie founder of Georgia, said : " This cruel custom of 
a private man's being supported in exercising more power over the man 
whom he affirms to have bought as his slave, than the magistrate has over 
the master, is a solecism in politics." — Stuart's Memoir of Sharp, p. 25. 

Rousseau said: "The terms slavery and right, contradict and exclude 
each other."' 

Button said : " It is apparent that the unfortunate negroes are endowed 
with excellent hearts, and possess the seeds of every human virtue. I can- 
not write their history without lamenting their miserable condition." " Hu- 
manity revolts at those odious oppressions that result from avarice." 

Brissot said : " Slavery, in all its forms, in all its degrees, is a violation 
of divine law, and a degradation of human nature." 

Sir William Jones said : " I pass with haste, by the coast of Africa, 
whence my mind turns with indignation at the abominable traffic in the 
human species, from which a part of our countrymen dare to derive their 
inauspicious wealth." 



Our limits forbid us to extend this list of witnesses, into 
which we have introduced but few of the names most prom- 
inently connected, in England and America, with specific 
enterprises for abolishing the slave trade and slavery. Nor 
have Ave quoted the more modern writers on the subject, nor 
many of the American statesmen during and since the Revo- 
lution, (some of them slave-holders,) whose testimony would 
have been appropriate. In another connection we may refer 
to some of them. Nor have we cited the long catalogue of 
eminent poets, all of whom, with scarcely an exception, have 
deplored and condemned slavery. And yet, our chapter of 
testimonies is sufficient to show that the moral sense, the 
reason, the sympathy, the humanity, the philosophy, and the 
professed religion of the civilized world, are against slavery, 
which is, of course, destined to fall. 



82 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 



CHAPTER V. 

ACTION OF RELIGIOUS BODIES AGAINST THE SLAVE TRADE 
AND SLAVERY, COMMENCING BEFORE THE AMERICAN REVO- 
LUTION, AND ITS RESULTS. 

George Fox in Barbadoes — William Edmundson, A.D. 1675 — Friends in England, 
A.D. 1727— 1761— 1763— 1772— Friends in America— -Yearly Meeting in Philadel- 
phia, A.D. 1696 — Gov. Penn, 1700 — Quarterly Meetings of Chester, Haddonfield, 
&c. Yearly Meeting, 1754 — 1774 — 1776 — Friends in New England — Rhode Island 
Quarterly Meeting, A.D. 1716— 1727— 1770— Yearly Meeting of New York, 
1759— Purchase Quarterly Meeting, 1767. Yearly Meeting, 1771 — 1781 — Yearly 
Meeting of Virginia, A.D. 1757— 1766— 1767— 1768— 1773— 1787— Compensation 
provided for Emancipated Slaves — Stirring Agitations among Friends during 
this Reformation — William Burling, Ralph Sandiford, Benjamin Lay, John Wool- 
man, Anthony Benezet — Congregationalists in America — Dr. Samuel Hopkins — 
Church at Newport, 1769. 

From the records of early anti-slavery testimony, we turn to 
those of early anti-slavery action. As those testimonies were 
evidently founded, for the most part, in the principles of the 
Christian religion, and were urged on religious considerations, 
it was natural that the early efforts against slavery and the 
slave trade should partake of the same character, and be pro- 
pounded in religious bodies. 

FRIENDS IN ENGLAND. 

George Fox, as already mentioned, remonstrated with the 
"Friends" in Barbadoes, concerning their treatment of the 
negroes. This was in 1671. He exhorted them to give their 
slaves religious instruction, and "bring them to know the 
Lord Christ." In his journal he says : 

" I desired, also, that they would cause their overseers to deal mildly and 
gently with their negroes, and not use cruelty towards them, as the manner 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 33 

of some had been ; and that, after certain years of servitude, tlicy should 
make them free."* 

Iii a public discourse, he said : 

" Let me tell you, it will doubtless be very acceptaole to the Lord, if so 
be that masters of families here, would deal so with their servants, and 
negroes, and blacks, whom they have bought with their money, as to let 
them go free, after they have served faithfully a considerable number of 
years, be it thirty, more or less, and when they go, and arc made free, let 
them not go away empty handed. "f 

"William Edmundsou, a fellow-laborer with Fox, bore a 
similar testimony. He complained of the herding of the slaves 
together like brute beasts, without any religious instruction, 
or a sufficiency of suitable sustenance. — Clarlcson, p. 5. 

Both Fox and Edmundson were charged with exciting the 
slaves to revolt, and the latter was arraigned before the gov- 
ernor, in 1675, on that false allegation. — " Brief Statement ," p. 6. 

Thus early began the false charge of bloody designs, and no 
peacefulness of principles, no mildness of manner and lan- 
guage, and no moderation of measures — though even fault}' 
in that direction, have ever exempted the earnest friends of 
emancipation from these charges. 

'* I do not find any individual of this Society (i. e. in England) moving in 
this cause, for some time after the death of George Fox and William 
Edmundson. The first circumstance of moment which I discover, is a 
resolution of the whole society, on the subject, at their yearly meeting, held 
in London, in the year 17-27. The resolution was in the following 
words" : — 

" It is the sense of this meeting, that the importing of negroes from their 
native country and relations, by Friends, is not a commendable or allowed 
practice, and is therefore censured by this meeting." — Clarksotis History, 
p. 51. 

From this record it is evident that Friends, in England, at 
this time, were, to a greater or less extent, implicated in the 
African slave trade. And it is equally clear from what fol- 
lows, that this very cautious and gentle admonition had not 

* Clarksori 1 s History, p. 50. 

t Brief Statement, &c, by the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting, 1848, page 6. 

3 



31 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

fully sufficed, in thirty-one years, to purge the Society from 
the guilt of that traffic. In 1758, the following resolution 
was adopted : 

" We fervently warn all in profession with us, that they carefully avoid 
being in any way concerned in reaping the unrighteous profits arising from 
the iniquitous practice of dealing in negro or other slaves, whereby, in the 
original purchase, one man selleth another, as he doeth the beasts that 
perish, without any better pretension to property in him, than that of superior 
force, in direct violation of the Gospel rule, which teacheth all to do as they 
would be done by, and to do good to all. We, therefore, can do no less than, 
with the greatest earnestness, impress it upon Friends, everywhere, that 
they endeavor to keep their hands clear of the unrighteous gain of oppres- 
sion." 

Three years afterwards, 1761, the Society took a further 
step, as appears by the following : 

" This meeting, having reason to apprehend that diverse, under our name, 
are concerned in the unchristian traffic in negroes, doth recommend it 
earnestly to the care of Friends, everywhere, to discourage, as much as in 
them lies, a practice so repugnant to our christian profession ; and to deal 
with all such as shall persevere in a conduct so reproachful to Christianity ; 
and disown them, if they do not desist therefrom.' 1 '' 

In 1763, this action was repeated, and the cords drawn still 
tighter, in the following : 

" We renew our exhortation that Friends, everywhere, be especially 
careful to keep their hands clear of giving encouragement, in any shape, to 
the slave-trade, being evidently destructive of the natural rights of mankind, 
who are all ransomed by one Savior, and visited by one divine light, in 
order to salvation, a traffic calculated to enrich and aggrandize some, 
upon the misery of others ; in its nature, abhorrent to every just and tender 
sentiment, and contrary to the whole tenor of the Gospel." 

" By the minute which was made on this occasion, I apprehend that no 
one belonging to the Society, could furnish even materials for such voyages." 
— Clarkson, p. 52. 

It is to be noticed that all this action was directed against 
the slave trade, or the importing of negroes. Nothing is said 
directly of slave holding, though slaves were then held in Eng- 
land, whether by Quakers we cannot tell, though Quakers in 
America held slaves at that time. 

In 1772, the Societ}' in England approved the " salutary 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 35 

endeavors " of Friends in America, to discourage the holding 
of slaves. 

FRIENDS IN AMERICA. 

The movement among Friends in America began earlier : 

"The Quakers in America, it must be owned, did must of them, originally, 
as other settlers there, with respect to the purchase of slaves." — Clarkson, 
p. 57. 

They, however, treated them with peculiar lenity, yet indi- 
viduals among them soon became^ uneasy about holding slaves 
at all. 

In the year 1G96 the yearly meeting of Philadelphia advised its members 
to " be careful net tu enceurage the bringing in of any more negroes, and 
that those who have negroes be careful of them, bring them tu meetings, 
have meetings with them in their families, and restrain them from loose and 
lewd living, as much as in them lies, and from rambling abroad, on First 
days, er other times."*— " Brief Statement,'''' &c, p. 8. 

The quarterly meetings of Chester, lladdonfield, Philadel- 
phia, Bucks, Burlington, and Salem, subordinate to the yearly 
meeting, took measures from time to time, on the subject. 
The quarterly meeting of Chester extended into Virginia. — 
" Brief Statement" &C. 

In the yearly meeting, the subject was kept alive by renewed 
testimonies from time to time, and advance steps were taken, 
until, in 175-i, the meeting recommended to " advise and deal 
with such as engage ' ' in the traffic. They also expressed a 
desire to guard against " promoting the bondage of such an 
unhappy people." They "observe that their number is, of 
late, increased among us." They intimate the injustice of 
living upon their unrequited labor, and beseech those who 
have received slaves as an inheritance that they so train them 



* "William Penn, while Governor, in 1700, laid before the meeting his concern on 
the same subject, recommending religious meetings with the slaves. " His attempts 
to improve their condition by legal enactments were defeated in the House of As- 
sembly." — lb., p. 9. A law imposing a duty of twenty pounds upon every slave 
imported, was a few years afterwards enacte 1. but disannulled by the Kritish 
Crown. — lb., p. 11. 



36 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

as to prepare tliem for freedom, if they should hereafter set 
them at liberty. — Clarhson's History, pp. 58, 59.* 
In 1774 another advance step was taken. 

"By a resolution of that year, all members concerned in importing, sell 
ing, purchasing, giving, or transferring negroes or other slaves, or other- 
wise acting in such a manner as to continue them in slavery beyond the 
term limited by law or custom (;'. e., for white persons), were directed to be 
excluded from membership, or disowned." — Clarksori's History, p. 60. 

" In the year 1776, the same yearly meeting carried the matter still 
farther. It was then enacted, That the owners of slaves, who refused to 
execute proper instruments for giving them their freedom, were to be dis- 
owned likewise." — lb. 

As the result of this action, it appears that the practice of 
slaveholding was generally discontinued within the bounds 
of the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting, not many years after- 
wards. The subordinate meetings took early measures for 
carrying out the views of the Yearly Meeting. The Phila- 
delphia Monthly Meeting reported, in 1781, that " there was 
but one case," under care, and, in 1783, that " there were no 
slaves owned by its members." 

"As the minute of 1781 is the last on record " (of the Yearly Meeting) 
" on this subject, which speaks of slaves being still owned by our members, 
it is probable that before the succeeding Yearly Meeting, they had all been 
freed." — Brief Statement, p. 35. 

These measures were followed by efforts for the religious 
instruction of the emancipated negroes ; and in some instances 
they were compensated for their past services. 



* From the more full quotation of this document, in the Brief Statement of 1813, 
we learn, that it also held the more stern language that follows : 

"And we entreat all to examine, whether the purchasing of a negro, either born 
here or imported, doth not contribute to a further importation, and consequently to 
the upholding all the evils above mentioned, and promoting man stealing— -the only 
theft which, by the Mosaic law, was punished with death : ' He that stealcth a man, 
and selleth him, or if Tie le found in lis land, he shall surely be put to death.'— 
Ex. 21 : 16."— Brief Statement, sec p. 18. 

So that the ecclesiastical testimony of the " Friends"— invidiously commended by 
3ome for its mildness, did not reach its object, till it had identified slaveholding 
with man stealing. This testimony is recorded as being "supposed to have been 
from the pen of Anthony Benczet." 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 37 

The course of action by the New England Yearly Meeting, 
and its subordinate meetings, was very similar, and but little 
later in dates. The earliest action on record is a query by 
the Monthly Meeting of Dartmouth to the Rhode Island 
Quarterly Meeting, in 1716, asking " whether it be agreeable 
to Truth, for Friends to purchase slaves, and keep them for a 
term of life ?" The question was referred back to the different 
monthly meetings composing that quarterly meeting. The 
answers of several meetings were in the negative. The matter 
came up again before the Rhode Island Quarterly Meeting, in 
1717, but no decisive minute was made on the subject. — In 
1727, the Yearly Meeting made a short minute censuring the 
practice " of importing negroes from their native country and 
relations." In 1760, the discipline was revised, and the lan- 
guage of the "printed epistle of the London Yearly Meeting 
of 1758, against dealing in negroes and other slaves," was 
incorporated into the discipline. In the same year the follow- 
ing inquiry was adopted : 

" Are Friends clear of importing negroes, or buying them when imported ; 
and do they use those well, where they are possessed by inheritance or 
otherwise, endeavoring to train them up in the principles of religion ?" 

In 1769, the Rhode Island Quarterly Meeting proposed to 
the Yearly Meeting such an amendment of this query as 
should not imply that the holding of slaves was allowed. 
The Yearly Meeting deferred action until 1770, when the 
query was so amended as to include the following : 

" And are all set at liberty that are of age, capacity and ability, suitable 
for freedom ?" 

This action was carried forward until, in 1782, the Yearly 
Meeting says — 

" We know not but all the members of tins meeting are clear of that 
iniquitous practice of holding or dealing with mankind as slaves." — Brief 
Statement, &c, pp. 44 to 47. 

It was not, however, until 1787, that the Yearly Meeting 
could report a satisfactory settlement for the past services of 
those who had been held in slavery. (lb.) 



38 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

The Yearly Meeting of New York, previous to 1759, had 
manifested its disapprobation of the slave trade. — The Pur- 
chase Quarterly Meeting, in 1767, suggested the inquiry, 
" whether it is consistent with a Christian spirit to keep those 
in slavery we have already in possession, by purchase, gift, or 
any other way ?" 

In 1771, the Yearly Meeting concluded " that those Friends 
who have negroes shall not sell them for slaves, excepting in 
cases of executors," &c, who are, in that case, to advise with 
their respective monthly meetings. — Measures were taken, the 
same year, to encourage manumissions. 

In 1776, the Yearly Meeting took still higher ground, 
refusing to accept or employ the services in the church, or 
"receive the collections," of those who "continue these poor 
people in bondage." 

In 1784, a solitary case of slaveholding was reported — and 
in 1787 there were none at all. 

In 1781, the Yearly Meeting advised each monthly meeting 
to appoint suitable persons to inspect the cases of the recent 
emancipations, and afford such assistance and advice, both in 
respect to the temporal and spiritual good of the emancipated, 
as might be in their power, and " endeavor to find what, in 
justice, may be due them." At the succeeding Yearly Meet- 
ing, it was recommended that committees be appointed by the 
monthly meetings to "hand out to the said negroes" "the 

sum or sums which may appear to be due them." "So 

faithfully and earnestly did Friends carry out these views of 
the Yearly Meeting, that in the year 1781 there appear to 
have been but three unsettled cases remaining. — " Brief State- 
ment" &c, pp. 47 to 51. 

The Yearly Meeting of Virginia introduced a query " de- 
signed to forbid the trafficking in slaves," in 1757. In 1764, 
the Meeting advised additional attention to the religious 
instruction and clothing of slaves. In 1766, it was proposed 
to forbid its members to purchase any more negroes, and 
the subject was referred back to the quarterly meetings. In 
1767, the Yearly Meeting could not unanimously conclude 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 39 

upon issuing any injunctions either with regard to purchasing 
or setting them free, but earnestly desired each member to 
be careful and not encumber himself or posterity with any 
further purchases. — In 17G8, this advice was made a rule of 
discipline. — In 1773, the Yearly Meeting earnestly recom- 
mended manumissions, and quoted the words of the prophet — 
" The people of the land have used oppression and exercised 
robbery, 1 ' &c. The measure was followed up till 1787, when 
it appeared that there were still some members who held 
slaves. It is stated that, after this, " the Yearly Meeting of 
Virginia gradually cleared itself of this grievous burthen :' r 
but the precise date of its final extinction is not given. — 
"Brief Statement," &c, pp. 51 to 56. 

A very interesting feature of this reformation among the 
Friends, was the compensation provided for the emancipated 
slaves, in striking contrast with the absurd claim, sometimes 
set up, for compensation to the master. Another circum- 
stance worthy of note is the uniformity and celerity with 
which the reformation was effected, so soon as the ecclesias- 
tical bodies adventured to characterize slaveholding, in the 
strong but truthful language of Scripture, as robbery and 
man-stealing ; giving proof of the earnestness and sincerity 
of their testimony, by taking measures for withdrawing reli- 
gious fellowship from slaveholders. It is stated that some 
were actually "disowned" for non-compliance. — "Brief State- 
ment" &c, p. 46. 

Nor was this great change effected in the Society of Friends 
without stirring agitations, exciting appeals, and long-con- 
tinued and earnest debates and discussions. The cautiously 
guarded and modified records of the ecclesiastical bodies, 
especially the more early testimonies, expressing, perhaps, in 
the language of compromise, the hesitant and even reluctant 
assent of the predominating and conservative portion of the 
body, must not be taken as specimens of the tone and manner 
of the agitators by whom the subject was continually pressed 
upon the attention of the Society, until final action was 



40 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

reached. A long succession of these untiring and zealous 
laborers were engaged in this great work. 

William Burling, of Long Island, was, perhaps, the first 
of these. Lie began his testimony early in life, and seldom 
if ever permitted a Yearly Meeting to assemble and separate 
without hearing his earnest remonstrance against their tolera- 
tion of slavery. 

Ralph Sandiford, of Philadelphia, was another earnest 
agitator. He published his "Mystery of Iniquity, in a brief 
examination of the practice of the times," in the year 1729. 
The language is described as bold, stirring, energetic, and 
uncompromising. The very title-page is a sufficient indica- 
tion of the fact. 

Benjamin Lay published his Treatise on Slave-keeping in 
1737. It was printed by Benjamin Franklin. The title of 
this book"- shows that he opposed not merely the slave trade 
and slave buying, (which was all that the Yearly Meeting was 
prepared to do, six years afterwards,) but likewise the prac- 
tice of slaveholding, and denounced it as a high crime. He 
is described by Clarkson as " a man of strong understanding, 
and of great integrity, but of warm and irritable feelings, 
and more particularly so when he was called forth on any 
occasion in which the oppressed Africans were concerned. "f 

* "All Slave-keepers, that keep the innocent in bondage, apostates.' 1 '' 

t Some specimens of his manner of agitating " the delicate question" may oe 
interesting. 

"Calling on a Friend in the city (Philadelphia), he was asked to sit down to 
breakfast. He first inquired, ' Dost thou keep slaves in thy house V On being 
answered in the affirmative, he said, 'Then I will not partake with thee of the fruits 
of thy unrighteousness.'— After an ineffectual attempt to convince a farmer and his 
wife in Chester county of the iniquity of keeping slaves, he seized their only child, 
a little girl of three years of age, under pretence of carrying her away, and when the 
cries of the child and his singular expedient alarmed them, he said, ' You see and. 
feel, now, a little of the distress which you occasion by the inhuman practice of 
slave-keeping." — First Annual Report, A 7 . Hampshire A. S. Society, ly John, Farmer , 
Esq. — Emancipator for August, 1835. 

At Friends' Monthly Meetings, if a slaveholder rose to speak, Benjamin Lay would 
rise and exclaim — " There's another negro master!" 

On one occasion he seated himself in a Friends' Meeting among slaveholders, with 
a bladder of bullock's blood secreted under his mantle, and at length broke the quiet 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 41 

For forty-one years, and until his death, in 1759, he bore an 
uncompromising and zealous testimony against the sin of 
slavery. 

John "Woolman travelled through the provinces as a preacher 
and anti-slavery agitator, from 1746 to 1767. lie travelled 
much of the time on foot, conversing with the people, and 
discoursing to public assemblies. 

Anthony Benezet published a work against slavery in 17G2, 
and another in 1767. lie wrote also in the public journals, 
in the almanacs, and labored in every practicable and suitable 
manner to convince the people of the unlawfulness of slavery. 

"Let all the evangelical denominations but follow the simple example of 
the Quakers in this country, and slavery would soon come to an end." — 
Albert Barnes. 

If to this statement were added the condition that the mem- 
bers of all these religious denominations, including the Qua- 
kers, would support the cause of righteousness in their political 
as well as ecclesiastical relations, the result could not be a 
matter of doubtful speculation. 

CONGREGATIONALISTS IN NEW ENGLAND. 

The brightest as well as the earliest exhibition of Christian 
church discipline against slavery, however, was in the instance, 
not of an extended ecclesiastical organization or sect, but of 
an Independent or Congregational Church in New England. 
When Dr. Samuel Hopkins, the celebrated theologian, re- 
moved to Newport, Rhode Island, in 1769, he found himself 
pastor of a church involved deeply in slaveholding and the 
African slave trade. He was not long in applying to those 

stillness of the worship by deliberately rising in full view of the whole audience, 
piercing the bladder, spilling the blood on the floor and seats, thus sprinkling some 
of it on the raiment of those near him, and exclaiming with all the solemn authority 
of an ancient prophet — " Thus shall the Lord spill the blood of those that traffic in 
the blood of their fellow-men !" — Some shrieked — some fainted, and the meeting 
broke up in confusion. 

" Modern" abolitionists have been censured as too denunciatory and violent. Not 
^infrequently they have been advised to take the good old Quaker abolitionists as 
models of mildness ! Do the advisers understand what thev are saving? 



42 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

practices the stern and unbending ethics derived from his then 
somewhat peculiar and most uncompromising theology, accord- 
ing to which, slaveholding could be nothing less than malum 
in se, in every instance sinful, without any valid excuse, or 
apology : a sin, like all other sin, to be cured or purged in no 
way but by its present and unconditional abandonment, at 
whatever cost, the case admitting of no prudential stipulations, 
and no delay. Admitting into his theory no such idea as 
that of a gradual regeneration or repentance, he could, of 
course, listen to no proposition for a gradual abandonment of 
slaveholding. His measures, therefore, were prompt, his 
purpose inflexible, his object determinate. It was not to the 
abuses of the system, nor to particular cases of crueltv that 
he directed attention, further than to ascertain and exhibit 
the principle that lay at the bottom of the mischief. His 
remedy was radical, applying to the root, not to the -branches. 
In the slave trade, with all its abominations and horrors, he 
saw only a particular manifestation or phase of slavery. With 
no extended ecclesiastical body to consult, to assist, or to im- 
pede him, he addressed his appeals and arguments directly to 
the consciences and the intellects of his congregation, — the 
party immediately concerned, and on them, in view of the com- 
ing Judgment, he cast the tremendous responsibility of direct 
and unambiguous action : 

The church was soon induced, as a Congregational body, 
to take the following action : 

" Resolved, that the slave trade and the slavery of the Africans, as it 
has existed among us, is a gross violation of the righteousness and benevo- 
lence which are so much inculcated in the gospel, and therefore we will not 
tolerate it in this Church.'''' 

The doctrines of modern abolitionists, of the inherent sinful- 
ness of slaveholding, and of the duty of immediate and un- 
conditional emancipation, were distinctly enunciated and con- 
sistently reduced to practice in this action of the Congrega- 
tional church in Newport. This was long before the com- 
mencement of any systematic efforts for abolishing the African 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 43 

slave trade, before the decision of the Somerset case, and be- 
fore any body of " Friends " had taken a similar position in 
respect to slavery, or had discontinued the practice. Had all 
the Congregational ministers and churches in this country 
taken the stand of Samuel Hopkins, and the church at New- 
port, from that time to the present, there is no reason to think 
that the condition and prospects of the nation would have 
been, at this time, what they now are. How many, or which 
of the Congregational churches in New England, at that 
period, came up to the standard of the church at Newport, 
we are unable to say. It is understood that there were seve- 
ral.* And it is certain that the sentiment was very generally 
received, for a time, and that the result was the termination 
of slavery in New England. Of this, and of the concurrent 
action of the Methodist Conference, and Presbyterian General 
Assembly, we shall treat, in connection with the records of a 
later period. We must first dispose of some points in the 
earlier history. 

* In a note to the second edition of Dr. Hopkins' Dialogue on Slavery, rc-pub- 
lished in 1785, it is said : " Since the first edition of this Dialogue, a number of 
churches in New England have purged themselves of this iniquity, and determined 
not to tolerate the holding of Africans in slavery." 



44 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 



CHAPTER VI. 

OF SLAVERY, AND ITS ABOLITION IN ENGLAND. 

Judicial Action — Granville Sharp — Early Introduction of Slavery into England ; 
its supposed legality (1700) — Opinion of York and Talbot, in favor of its legality 
(1729) — Effects of this Opinion — Slave Traffic in England — Case of Jonathan 
Strong — Efforts of Sharp — His Investigation of British Law — Declares Slavery to 
be illegal — Publishes his argument. — Treats Slavery as illegal, though the Courts 
and Public Sentiment were against him— Case' of Thomas Lewis — Decision of 
Lord Chief Justice Mansfield, sustaining the legality of Slavery — Sharp enters 
his Protest — Blackstone alters his Commentaries to defeat Sharp, and favor the 
Slaveholders — Case of James Somerset — The Argument — A Decision found 
against Slavery in the times of Queen Elizabeth — Lord Mansfield hesitates — An 
interval before the decision — Sharp anticipates the result, and memorializes Lord 
North against Slavery in the Colonies — State of Public Sentiment against Slavery — 
Final decision of Lord Mansfield (1772), releasing Somerset, and declaring Slavery 
illegal in England — Second Memorial of Sharp to Lord North, admonishing him 
of the duty of suppressing Slavery in the Colonies, agreeably to the decision of 
Lord Mansfield. 

As church action against slavery naturally follows and 
grows out of religious teachings and testimonies against the 
sin of slavery, so judicial and legislative action against the 
practice, naturally follows and grows out of both the preced- 
ing. The laws of a country are an index, to a great extent, 
of the prevalent religion of a country, and it is difficult, if not 
impossible, to maintain, for any length of time, a code of laws 
that essentially conflict with the religion of the people. 

From the records of early religious testimony and action 
against slavery, we come to those of judicial action. 

The first laborer in this department of benevolent enterprise, 
in England, sa}<s Clarkson, was Granville Sharp, "distin- 
guished from those who preceded him in this particular, that 
whereas they were only writers, he was both a writer and an 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 45 

actor in the cause." His first effort in 17G7, for the release of 
an individual slave, was followed, not long afterwards, by 
svstcmatic endeavors to overthrow slavery itself in the British 
dominions, and particularly in England. 

The introduction of slavery into England, appears to have 
been upon the same foundation, (in respect to its legality,) as 
its introduction into the North American colonies. That is, 
it was clone without the authority of any direct statute ; and 
it was done in the presence and in palpable violation of Eng- 
lish Common Law. If it could plead any legal warranty, it 
was that of the royal permission to transport Africans " with 
their own free consent," into the colonies, and the Act of Par- 
liament "for extending and improving the trade to Africa," 
which prohibited " any violence to the natives." 

How early slaves were introduced into England, we cannot 
exactly determine. " Before the year 1700," says Clarkson, 
"planters, merchants, and others, resident in the West Indies, 
but coming to England, were accustomed to bring with them 
certain slaves, to act as servants with them during their stay." 
They frequently absconded, and were sometimes seized and 
sent back by force. A sentiment had come down from former 
ages that Christians could not enslave Christians, and that as 
soon as an Englishman's slave was baptized, he became free. 
In consequence of this sentiment, it became common for pious 
clergymen to baptize all the slaves they could, providing 
" god-fathers " for them, according to the usages of the Church 
of England. These god-fathers were in the habit of vindicat- 
ing their high claim to the title, by espousing the cause of 
their god-children, and demanding their freedom. For a time. 
this held the slave-masters in check, as they were " afraid to 
carry off their slaves by force, and equally afraid to bring any 
of the cases before a public court." 

'• In this dilemma, they applied, in 1729, to York and Talbot, the Attorney 
and Solicitor-General, for the time being, and obtained from them, the 
following strange opinion : — 'We are of opinion that a slave, by coming 
from the West Indies into Great Britain or Ireland, either with or without 
his master, does not become free, and that his master's right and property in 



46 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

him is not thereby determined or varied, and that baptism doth not bestow 
freedom upon him, or make any alteration in his temporal condition, in these 
kingdoms. We are also of opinion that the master may legally compel him 
to return again, to the plantations.' " 

" This cruel and illegal opinion was delivered in 1729. The planters, 
merchants, and others, gave it, of course, all the publicity in their power ; 
and the consequences were as might easily have been apprehended. In a 
little time, slaves absconding, were advertised in the London papers, as 
runaways, and rewards offered for the apprehension of them; in the same 
brutal manner as we find them advertised in the land of slavery. They 
were advertised, also, in the same papers, to be sold at auction, sometimes 
by themselves, and at others, with horses, chaises, and harness. They were 
seized also by their masters, or by persons employed by them, in the very 
streets, and dragged from thence to the ships ; and so unprotected, now, 
were these poor slaves, that persons, no wise concerned with them, began to 
institute a trade in their persons, making agreements with captains of ships, 
going to the West Indies, to put them on board at a certain price." This 
''shows, as all history does, that where there is a market for the persons 
of human beings, all kind of enormities will be practiced to obtain them.''' — 
Clarksoti's History, &c, pp. 38-9. 

For forty-three }^ears did this " illegal opinion " of York 
and Talbot prevail in Great Britain instead of law; nay, in 
opposition to the fundamental law of the realm. Such was 
the state of things when, in 1767, as before mentioned, Gran- 
ville Sharp undertook the liberation of Jonathan Strong, 
claimed as a slave by David Lisle, a lawyer and slave-master 
of Barbadoes, then residing in London. 

" But the lawyers whom Sharp consulted, declared the laws were against 
him. Sir James Eyre, Recorder of the city, whom he retained as his 
counsel, adduced to him York and Talbot's opinion, and informed him that 
Lord Chief Justice Mansfield agreed with those gentlemen." — Stuart's 
Memoir of Sharp, p. P. 

" Mischief framed by law, yet against law, thus took deep root in 
Britain." " At this time slavery had disgraced the British Colonies in 
America and in the West Indies, for two hundred years. The righteous 
law of the empire had been evaded or perverted, and opinion and precedent 
had been substituted for law." — Ibid, pp. 6-7. 

This, Granville Sharp understood, though he stood alone. 
He had not been educated a lawyer. But he understood, 
better than York and Talbot, (as the event proved,) and bet- 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. -1 7 

ter than Mansfield and Blackstone, the sacred and the ohi 
less nature of law. A legal triumph was in reserve for him, 
the most sublime and august of any on the records of modern 
jurisprudence. 

But it was not won in the controversy concerning Jonathan 
Strong. Some informality in the proceedings led to his dis- 
charge by the Mayor. lie was, however, instantly seized 
again by Captain Laird, (about to sail for the AVest Indies,) 
on behalf of John Kerr, to whom Lisle had sold him. This 
seizure was made in the presence of the mayor and others, be- 
fore whom also, Granville Sharp, with consummate general- 
ship and promptitude, stepped up to Captain Laird, and, tap- 
ping him on the shoulder, exclaimed: "I charge you, in the 
name of the king, with an assault upon the person of Jonathan 
Strong, and all these are my witnesses !" Laird was intimi- 
dated, let go his grasp, and Sharp conveyed away the ran- 
somed captive in triumph. This led to a suit against Sharp, 
the trial of which was deferred by the plaintiffs for two years, 
and then withdrawn by them under charge of treble costs for 
the delay. 

During these two years, Mr. Sharp applied himself, dili- 
gently, to a further study of the law, by which his former po- 
sition was fortified, and he was prepared for any future litiga- 
tion on the subject. In the course of this investigation, he 
applied to the great Doctor (afterwards Judge) Blackstone, 
for his opinion. " He was not, however, satisfied with it," 
says Clarkson, " when he received it, nor could he obtain any 
satisfactory answer from several other lawyers, to whom he 
afterwards applied." Thrown, therefore, upon his own indus- 
try and resources, he worked out the problem alone. 

" The result of his research, was a tract, ' On the injustice and dangerous 
tendency of tolerating slavery, or even of admitting the least claim to private 
property, in the persons of men, in England."" — Stuart's Memoir, p. 8. 

" In this work"* (says Clarkson) " he refuted, in the clearest manner, 
the opinion of York and Talbot. He produced against it the opinion of 

* Mr. Clarkson gives, as the title of the book, " A Representation of the Injustice 
and Dangerous Tendency of Tolerating Slavery in England." 



48 GEEAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

Lord Chief Justice Holt, who, many years before, had determined that 
every slave coming into England became free. He attacked and refuted it, 
again, by a learned and laborious inquiry into all the principles of villeinage. 
He refuted it, again, by showing it to be an axiom in the British Constitu- 
tion, ' That every man in England, was free to sue for, and defend his 
rights, and that force cannot be used without a legal process,' leaving it 
with the judges to determine whether an African was a man. He attacked 
also, the principle of Judge Blackstone, and showed where his error lay. 
This valuable book, containing these and all other kinds of arguments, on 
the subject, he distributed, but particularly among the lawyers, giving them 
an opportunity of refuting or acknowledging the doctrines it contained." — 
Clarkson's History, p. 42. 

Several cases were afterwards tried, in which the slaves 
■were set at liberty ; but " none of the cases had yet been 
pleaded upon the broad ground, ' Whether an African slave 
coming into England, became free.' This great question had 
been studiously avoided. It was still, therefore, left in doubt." 
Mr. Sharp continually acted on the ground that there was no 
legal slavery in England, though the judges had not so deci- 
ded. The suspense at length became painful to both parties, 
and there was a general anxiety to have the controversy deci- 
ded. — Clarkson, p. 42, Stuart, p. 10. 

In the meantime, some of the cases were so decided as to 
afford great encouragement to the slave party. An African, 
named Thomas Lewis, had escaped from his master, Mr. Sta- 
pylton, in London. He was recaptured, and put on board 
a vessel for the West Indies. The vessel had reached the 
Downs, and was already under way, when a habeas corpus was 
carried on board, and the man released, and sent on shore. 
A bill was found against Stapylton and his two assistants, and 
the case was tried before the Court of King's Bench, Lord 
Chief Justice Mansfield presiding, the 20th of February, 1771. 
The jury returned a verdict of guilty: "but so fraught was 
Mansfield's mind, still, with the false views of the day, that 
herefused'to proceed to judgment, and the criminals escaped.'" 
— " Against this proceeding of the Judge, as an open contempt 
of the laws of England, Granville Sharp prepared a strong pro- 
test." — Stuart's Memoir, p. 10. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 49 

Another incident, and a very remarkable one, illustrates 
the methods resorted to, by gentlemen of the highest stand- 
ing in the legal profession, at that time, in England, to sustain 
the slave interest, at the expense of those great fundamental 
maxims of Common Law, of which they were themselves the 
recognized expounders, and which they could enunciate, dis- 
tinctly enough, except when overawed by " the mighty wealth 
and influence of the West India faction," before whom, king 
and nobles, courts of justice, parliaments and doctors of the 
law, bowed down in abject submission. 

" In the beginnings of his researches, Granville Sharp had found and 
noted the following passage in Blackstone's Commentaries, Book I., page 
123. Edition 1st — ' And this spirit of liberty is so deeply implanted in our 
Constitution, and rooted in our very soil, that a slave or a negro, the moment 
he lands in England, falls under the protection of the laws, and, with regard 
to all national rights, becomes eo instanti, a freeman.' 

" This passage being quoted in one of the trials, was triumphantly repelled 
by the opposite counsel, who produced the volume from which the quotation 
was made, and instead of the words as noted by Granville Sharp, read as 
follows : ' A negro, the moment he lands in England, falls under the pro- 
tection of the laws, and so far becomes a free man, though the master's 
right to his service may possibly remain.' 

" Upon further investigation, it was found that, in the course of the trials. 
Dr. Blackstone himself had made this alteration in the subsequent editions .'" 
— Stuart's Memoir of Sharp, p. 19. 

. Such was the condition of things, when, at length, a case 
came before the courts that presented a fair opportunity to 
test the great question of legal slavery in England. This 
opportunity was improved, and the issue was joined. 

James Somerset " had been brought to England in November, 1769, by 
his master, Charles Stewart, from Virginia, and in process of time had left 
him. Stewart had him suddenly seized, and carried on board the Ann and 
Mary, Captain Knowles, in order to be taken to Jamaica, and there sold for 
a slave." 1 

"On February 7, 1772, the cause was tried in the King's Bench, before 
Lord Chief Justice Mansfield, aided by Justices Ashton, Welles and Ash- 
hurst. The question at issue was — ' Is every man in England entitled to 
the liberty of his person, unless forfeited by the laws of England ?' This 
was affirmed by the advocates of Somerset ; and Mr. Sergeant Davy, w hi 

4 



50 GKEAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

opened his cause, broadly declared, ' that no man at this day is, or can be, 
a slave in England.' " — Stuart's Memoir, p. 11. 

In the course of the argument a precedent was adduced in 
favor of freedom. " This was the case of Cartwright, who 
brought a slave from Russia, and would scourge him. For 
this he was questioned, and it was resolved, that England was 
too pure an air for slaves to breathe in" — See Rushworth's Collec- 
tions, p. 468. This was in the 11th of Queen Elizabeth. — lb. 

Lord Mansfield was evidently beginning to waver. 

" In order that time might be given for ascertaining the law fully on this 
head, the case was argued at three different sittings. First in January, 
secondly in February, and thirdly in May, 1772. And that no decision 
otherwise than what the law warranted, might be given, the opinion of the 
judges were taken on the pleadings." — Clarkson's Hist. p. 43. 

" Granville Sharp availed himself, with his usual zeal, of this interval, 
and, among the other measures by which he sought to obtain an equitable 
decision, he addressed a Letter to Lord North, dated Feb. 18th, 1772." — 
Stuart's Memoir, p. 12. 

In this Letter Mr. Sharp anticipates a- decision of the courts 
against slavery, and says — "We must judge by law, not by 
precedent." — He further intimates the illegality of slavery in 
the American Colonies, in the following paragraph : 

" I might indeed allege that many of the plantation laws (like every other 
act that contains anything which is malum in se. evil in its own nature,) 
are already null and void in themselves ; because they want every necessary 
foundation to render them valid, being absolutely contradictory to the laws 
of reason and equity, as well as the laws of God." — lb. p. 13. 

By this time the eyes of the British public, from the mem- 
bers of the administration down to the mass of the intelligent 
inhabitants, were fixed upon Lord Mansfield and the Court 
of King's Bench,' awaiting, with deep interest and anxious 
suspense, their decision. It was a healthful scrutiny, not 
unfclt by the Lord Chief Justice and his associates. New and 
enlarged views of the nature and character of LAW had been 
impressed upon the nation and upon the national judiciary, 
by the tireless labors and profound investigations of Gran- 
ville Sharp. And yet it required a desperate struggle to 



SLAVKllY AND FREEDOM. 51 

break away from the meshes of precedent and opinion, and 
restore the ascendancy of impartial and equitable law. 

" Lord Mansfield delayed judgment, and twice threw out the suggestion 
• that the master might put an end to the present litigation, hy manumitting 

the slave.' But the base suggestion was, providentially, not attended to. 
The judgment was demanded; and the judgment was given on Monday, 
22d of June, 1772. After much lawyer-like circumlocution, Lord Mans- 
field decided as follows : 

•' Immemorial usage preserves the memory of positive law, long after all 
traces of the occasion, reason, authority, and time of its introduction are 
lost, and in a case so odious as the condition of slaves, must be taken 
strictly : (tracing the subject to natural principles, the claim of slavery can 
never be supported.) The power claimed by this return never was in Use 
here. We cannot say the cause set forth in this return is allowed or 
approved of by the laws of this kingdom, and therefore the man must be 
discharged." — Stuart's Memoir, p. 17. " Mr. Sharp felt it his duty, imme- 
diately after this trial, to write" (again) " to Lord North, then principal 
minister of State, warning him, in the most earnest manner, to abolish, 
immediately, both the slave trade and the slavery of the human species, 
in all the British dominions, as utterly irreconcilable with the principles 
of the British Constitution, and the established religion of the land." — 
Clarkson's Hist., p. 44. 

The measure here insisted on by Granville Sharp, was evi- 
dently required by the decision of the Somerset case, and had 
it been carried into effect, at that time, there would have been 
no slaver}'' now in the United States. 

Mr. Clarkson awards much credit to the counsel employed 
on this trial, Davy, Glynn, Ilargrave, Mansfield, and Alleyne, 
but chiefly to Granville Sharp, " who became the first great 
actor in it, who devoted his time, his talents, and his substance 
to this Christian undertaking, and by whose laborious 
researches the very pleaders themselves were instructed and 
benefited."— p. 44. 

" It ought to be remembered that, while Granville Sharp thus boldly 
remonstrated with the government of his country, he filled a government 
situation, and was dependent for his present subsistence, and his future pros- 
pects in life, upon the ministry of the day." — Stuart's Memoir, p. 15. 

Thus was the guilty fiction of legal slavery in England 
exploded, after having been acted upon as though it were a 



52 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

truth for at least three-fourths of a century, and confirmed 
by the highest official authority for forty-three years. Of the 
magnitude, the importance, and the legal consequences of this 
judicial decision, which forever settled the slave question in 
England, without legislative action or executive interference, 
we propose not to speak here. In another connection it may 
be adverted to again. Very possibly its study may assist in 
the detection and correction of similar mistakes in the judicial 
action of other countries, besides England. If York and 
Talbot, and Blackstone and Mansfield were mistaken, other 
learned judges may be. If, under the British monarchy, a 
private individual may peacefully revolutionize the jurispru- 
dence of his country, it cannot be out of place, nor arrogant 
for the friends of liberty in republican America to study, to 
understand, to insist upon the principles of constitutional and 
common law, in their bearing upon the same great practical 
question, in their own country, as Granville Sharp did in his. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 53 



CHAPTER VII. 

OF EFFORTS FOR ABOLISHING THE AFRICAN SLAVE TRADE. 

Relaxation of effort — American Revolution — Sharp espouses the cause of the Colo- 
nies — Thomas Clarkson's early life — Granville Sharp — Slave ship " Zong" (1781) 
— Trial of this case (17S3) — Slave-traders sustained — Sharp's Report of the Trial 
—Committee instituted to act against the Slave Trade (1787) — Unfortunate 
Compromise — Policy of opposing the Slave Trade, but not Slavery — Solemn Pro- 
test of Granville Sharp — William Wilberforce — Public Agitation — Abstinence 
from Slave Products — "Wilberforce denounced in the House of Lords — Influence 
of John Wesley — of the Quakers — the Baptists — Inquiry in King's Privy Council, 
1788; also in House of Commons, introduced by Wm. Pitt — Dates of various 
movements in Parliament till 1S06 — Slave Trade abolished in Parliament in 1807 — 
Review of this struggle — Slavery declared illegal in 1772, yet the Slave Trade 
tolerated till 1807— The turning point— The legality of the Slave Trade— Pitt 
proved it illegal — Abolition of the Slave Trade abortive — Premature and misplaced 
gratulation and triumph. Mr. Clarkson's late retraction of his grand error (1845). 
Testimony to the impossibility of suppressing the traffic while Slavery continued 
(1845) — Continued profitableness of the Slave Trade — Increased horrors of the 
Middle Passage — Slave Trade actually increased instead of being suppressed. 

The speedy and glorious success of the efforts of Granville 
Sharp and a few others for uprooting slavery from the soil of 
Great Britain, should have encouraged Christian philanthro- 
pists, in both hemispheres, one would think, to co-operate in 
similar efforts to uproot slavery throughout the colonial pos- 
sessions of Great Britain, over which the same great principles 
of the British Constitution, and of English Common Law, 
were recognized as holding paramount authority. It is not 
improbable that the growing difficulties between the North 
American colonies and the mother country, ripening into a 
civil war, soon after the decision of the Somerset case, may have 
interrupted the correspondence just beginning to be opened 



54 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

between the friends of liberty in the two countries. The Brit- 
ish West India Islands, however, might have presented a held 
of operation for the abolitionists in England, though there 
may have been none in the islands to co-operate with them. 

From some cause, no such efforts were made. Granville 
Sharp, in 1774, published a tract in favor of the rights of the 
American colonies, of which he presented, two hundred and 
fifty copies to Dr. Franklin, who dispatched them to America. 
" It was immediately and extensively republished in the colo- 
nies." The next year, 1775, on hearing of the commence- 
ment of hostilities, near Boston, he retired from the post he 
had held under the British administration, which was his only 
means of subsistence. — Stuart's Memoir of Sharp, pp. 21, 22. 

The entire period of the American Revolutionary War, ter- 
minating in 1783, appears to have been marked by an almost 
total suspension of active labors on the part of the friends of 
the negroes in England. And when, not long after, their la- 
bors were renewed, they took the form of opposition to the 
African slave trade,, the horrible cruelties of which, at that 
time, having been, in some cases, exposed, excited the sympa- 
thies and the indignation of many who had never reflected 
profoundly upon the iniquity involved in the slave system 
itself. 

Thomas Clarkson, the chief actor, for a long time, in this 
enterprise, then a young man, a student at Cambridge, had 
obtained a college prize for an Essay on the Slave Trade, 
which was printed in 1785, and attracted some attention. 
He frankly confessed afterwards, that his only motive, in the 
first place, was " that of other young men in the University, 
the wish of being distinguished, or of obtaining literary honor." 
But the facts he had collected, made so deep an impression 
upon him, that he soon " interested himself in it, from a mo- 
tive of duty," and afterwards relinquished his prospects of 
promotion in the profession of a clergyman in the established 
church, for which he was preparing, in order to devote him- 
self to the enterprise of abolishing the African slave trade.— 
ClarJcson's History, pp. 79-86. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 55 

The attention of Granville Sharp, some time previous, had 
been intensely directed to the slave trade, by a most thrilling 
illustration of its atrocity. The slave ship Zong, Captain Col- 
lingwood, from Africa, freighted with slaves for Jamaica, in 
1781, was visited with a dreadful mortality among the slaves. 
Under a false pretence of scarcity of water, the captain ordered a 
larsre number of the sick slaves thrown overboard, that the loss 
might fall on the insurers, (as merchandize thrown overboard 
for the safety of the vessel,) instead of falling on the owners, 
if tliey died from sickness. The question growing out of this 
transaction, and before the court, in 1783, was not concerning 
the murder of these men, but simply whether the owners or 
the insurers should lose the pecuniary amount of their value ! 
The Solicitor-General, J. Lee, said : 

" This is a case of goods and chattels. It is really so ; it is a case of 
throwing over goods, for, to this purpose, and for the purpose of insurance, 
they are goods and property ; whether right or wrong, we have nothing to 
do with it." 

Lord Mansfield said : 

" The matter left to the jury is — Was it from necessity 1 for they (the 
court) had no doubt (though it shocks one very much) that the case of 
slaves is the same as if horses had been thrown overboard. It is a very 
shocking case." 

The verdict of the jury, on the first trial, was for the captain 
and owners. A new trial was granted, and the insurers gained 
their cause. But no criminal prosecution could he had against 
the murderers! Any such accusation, legal gentlemen agreed, 
" would argue nothing less than madness !" — Clarlcson's His- 
tory, p. -15. Stuart's Memoirs, pp. 29-31. 

Granville Sharp " was present at this trial, and procured the attendance 
of a short-hand writer, to take down the facts," " which he communicated 
to the public afterwards. He communicated them also, with a copy of the 
trial, to the Lords of the Admiralty, as guardians of justice on the high 
seas, and to the Duke of Portland, as Minister of State. No notice, how- 
ever, was taken, by any of these, of the information which had thus been 
sent to them." — Clarkson, p. 46. 



56 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

In his address to the Duke of Portland, Mr. Sharp warned 
him of " the absolute necessity to abolish the slave trade, and 
West Indian slavery." — Stuart, p. 31. 

It is easy to conceive that while the public sympathy was 
so strongly acted upon by such astounding developments con- 
cerning the slave trade, an effort for its abolition would be 
more likely to win at once a cheap general favor, than an ef- 
fort for the abolition of slavery. But benevolent enterprises, 
founded on mere sympathy, are not likely to be as wisely di- 
rected, as consistently supported, or as really and permanently 
successful as those that are likewise seen to be deeply imbed- 
ded and fortified in the fundamental principles of moral right. 
The history of the nominal abolition of the African slave 
trade is deeply interesting, as affording a striking exemplifi- 
cation of one class of these experiments. 

The committee instituted in June 1787, for " effecting the 
abolition of the slave trade," was composed of twelve members, 
nine of whom were Quakers. Of the three others, one was 
Thomas Clarkson, and one was Granville Sharp, the latter of 
whom was appointed chairman. An earnest discussion took 
place in the committee, on the question whether they should 
direct their efforts against the slave trade alone, or against the 
slave trade and slavery. All the members, except Granville 
Sharp, were in favor of acting, only against the slave trade. 

The arguments in favor of this course are stated in his his- 
tory, at some length, by Mr. Clarkson. Two distinct evils, 
the slave trade and slavery, presented themselves, he says, to 
their attention, and both needing removal. " It soon appeared 
to the committee that to aim at the removal of both, would be 
to aim at too much, and that by doing this, we might lose all." 
"The question then was, which of the two would they take 
as their object." " By aiming at the slave trade, they w r ere 
laying the axe at the very root." Pp. 27, 28. 

This view is the more remarkable as being found in the 
same volume in which the same writer had said : " All history 
shows, from the time of Joseph, that where there is a market 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 57 

for the persons of human beings, all kinds of enormities will 
be practiced to obtain them." P. 39. 

It is still more mortifying to find Air. Clarkson, at different 
points in the succeeding history, in the attitude of disclaiming 
on behalf of the committee, any intention of promoting eman- 
cipation. Thus, in his intercourse with Mirabeau, and the 
French National Assembly : 

" Emancipation is now stated to be the object of the friends of the 
negroes. This charge I repelled, by addressing myself to Monsieur Beau- 
vet. I explained to him the views of the different societies which had 
taken up the cause of the Africans, and I desired him to show my letters to 
the planters." — p. 211. 

Though it was held by the committee, including Mr. Clark- 
son, that "in aiming at the slave trade they were striking at 
the root," yet, in his " Summary View of the Slave Trade, 
and. of the probable consequences of its abolition," Mr. Clark- 
son apparently labors to reconcile the abolition of the slave 
trade with the continuance and increase of slave-holding, a view 
Avhich seems designed to conciliate the planters. 

" If the slaves were kindly treated in our colonies, they ivould increase. 
The abolition of the slave trade would necessarily secure such a treatment, 
and would produce many other advantages," &c. — p. 96. 

The same view was afterwards taken by Mr. Wilberforce 
and Mr. Pitt, in their speeches in Parliament. Little did they 
imagine that the slave trade, though legally abolished, would 
survive and flourish after the actual abolition of slavery in the 
British colonies, because slavery would exist elsewhere. 

Even at the time of writing his History of the enterprise, 
Mr. Clarkson seems to have entertained a high opinion of the 
sagacity of the committee in making this decision. 

" Thus, at the very outset," says he, " they took a ground which was 
forever tenable. Thus they were enabled to answer the objection which 
was afterwards so constantly and so industriously circulating against them, 
that they were going to emancipate the slaves. And I have no doubt that 
this was a wise decision, contributing greatly to their success, for I am per- 
suaded that if they had adopted the other object, they would not, for years, 
if ever, have succeeded in their attempt." — Clarkson's History, p. 98. 



58 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

What kind of "success " was realized, after twenty years 
of labor, and forty more of triumph and gratulation, will.be 
seen in the sequel. 

Granville Sharp stood alone in the committee, in opposing 
their decision in this matter. 

" He solemnly and vehemently remonstrated with the Committee against 
the resolution which they had adopted. He declared that, ' as slavery was 
as much a crime against God as the slave trade, it became the committee 
to exert themselves equally against the continuance of both, and he did not 
hesitate to pronounce all present guilty before God, for shutting those who 
were then slaves out of the pale of their approaching labors.' He delivered 
this protest with a loud voice, a powerful emphasis, and both hands lifted 
up towards heaven, as was usual with him when much moved. The Com- 
mittee acknowledged the criminality of both to be the same, but they ad- 
hered to their resolution, fearing that if they attacked, at once, both slavery 
and the slave trade, they would succeed against neither." — Stuart's Me- 
moir of Sharp, p. 56. 

Having delivered this testimony, and conceiving, as he 
seems to have done, that the responsibility rested on him no 
longer, he consented to act with the committee, though with 
such singular modesty, (notwithstanding his Christian bold- 
ness) that "he would never assume the chair"' — "while he 
sustained the responsibility and discharged the duty of the 
office."" 

" I have attended above seven hundred Committees and Sub-Committees 
with him," says Clarkson, "yet, though sometimes but few were present, 
he always seated himself at the end of the room ; choosing rather to serve 
the glorious cause, in humility, through conscience, than in the character of 
a distinguished individual." 

Among the early patrons of the enterprise of abolishing 
the slave trade, was William Wilberforce, member of Parlia- 
ment, with whom Mr. Clarkson, Mr. Sharp, and several others, 
had been in the habit of holding consultations before the 
organization of the Committee, and preliminary to that mea- 
sure. 

Mr. Clarkson, at the request of the Committee, visited 

* Vide Stuart's Memoir, p. 56. 



SLAVERY AND FEE E DOM. 59 

several different commercial cities m the kingdom, to obtain 
further information, before commencing the agitation of the 
subject in Parliament. He likewise visited France, to secure 
the co-operation of the French National Assembly; but this 
mission was a failure. Correspondence was likewise held 
with friends of the cause in America, and their co-operation 
secured, to effect the abolition of the slave trade by our 
Government. The public mind was operated upon in various 
ways. A sentiment averse to the use of slave-grown products 
was cherished in the literature of the country. At one period, 
the school books, both of England and of the United States, 
abounded in expressions of this sentiment. 

" Three hundred thousand persons, at this period, refrained from sugar 
altogether, perceiving that by usmg it they were directly supporting the 
slave system they abhorred. Three hundred and ten petitions were pre- 
sented from England, one hundred and eighty-seven from Scotland, and 
twenty from Wales." — Stuart's Memoir, p. 51-2. 

Could this sentiment against the use of slave products have 
arisen to the dignity of a moral principle, in the minds of 
these philanthropists, and had it been guided by a sufficient 
degree of reflection and intelligence, it might have suggested 
the necessity of an enterprise against Slavery — which fur- 
nishes slave products — as well as against the slave trade. 

As it was, the country was extensively agitated, and a vio- 
lent opposition was roused, which was continued for twenty 
years, led on by some of the principal men of the nation, and 
sustained by the entire "West India interest. In the cities the 
opposition was violent. At Liverpool, attempts were made 
to throw Mr. Clarkson into the dock. In the House of Lords, 
the abolitionists were stigmatized by the Duke of Clarence, 
afterwards King William IV., " as fanatics and hypocrites, 
among whom he included Mr. Wilberforce, by name."* Many 
years afterwards, he had the honor of giving the royal assent 
to a bill for abolishing, not the African slave trade, but slavery 
itself, in the West Indies ! — A more protracted or a more vio- 

* Olarieon's History, p. 323. 



60 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

lent contest could hardly have been witnessed, had the effort 
been made against slavery itself. While the ranks of the 
opposition could have done nothing more, the friends of the 
negroes would have been doubly armed with the whole pano- 
ply of divine truth, and would have been spared those pitiful 
and indefensible disclaimers that so much crippled and em- 
barrassed them, and their successors, at a later day. 

We must not forget to notice the important fact, that during 
the whole of this contest against the slave trade, as in the 
previous one of Granville Sharp against slavery in England, 
the conscience and the humanity of the country were neither 
counteracted nor unsustained by the religion of the country. 
Churches and Ministers, so far from opposing human progress 
and liberty, very extensively regarded it their proper business 
to urge them onward. The Society of Friends, having pre- 
viously purged their own community, were ready to cast their 
influence on the right side. 

But the Friends were not alone. The eloquent and cele- 
brated letter of John Wesley, on his death-bed, (1791) to 
William Wilberforce, is to be regarded not merely as an ex- 
pression of his own personal feelings in respect to the pending 
contest, but as a specimen of the religious sentiment in the 
midst of which he was moving, and which it was the business 
of his life to commend and communicate to others, as belong:- 
ing to the sanctification which fits men for heaven. In this 
letter the opponents of abolition are alluded to as the confed- 
erates of "devils," and American slavery is denominated 
"the vilest that ever saw the sun." This was Methodism, 
when Methodism was vitalized by the Spirit of God, and 
clothed with Divine power. 

But Baptists in England were not behind Methodists, at 
this period, nor have they since been. It was during the pro- 
gress of this same contest, and very nearly at the same date, 
that " one of the ablest writers and soundest divines who have 
ever adorned the Baptist denomination, good old Abraham 
Booth," by his preaching and in his correspondence (1792) with 
brethren in America, bore a similar testimony. Lie, too, 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 61 

along with Grotius, and Wesley, and Edwards, and Portcus, 
and Macknight, and Scott, and the American Presbyterian 
Church, (previous to 1818), understood that modern slave- 
holding falls under the condemnation of "man-stealing," as 
prohibited by Moses, in Exodus 21 : 16, and condemned by 
Paul in 1 Tim. 1 : 10. The sermon of Eld. James Dove was 
still earlier, (1789,) and had direct and special reference to the 
same great struggle, in which no good men were neutral. 

Not only Baptist ministers but Baptist Churches and Bap- 
tist Associations in England, came up to the work, in good 
earnest. The idea that the enterprise was too secular or too 
political for the co-operation of churches and ecclesiastical 
bodies, seems not to have embarrassed them.* 

The King directed a privy council to consider the state of 



* " The Elders and Messengers of the several Baptist Churches meeting at Fal- 
mouth, Chasewater, Plymouth Dock, Plymouth," and (twelve other Churches) 
"having received letters also from Portsmouth, Sarum" (and twenty other churches 
—making 3S Churches in all), "heing met in association at Plymouth, May 25-(i, 
1790, a letter received last year from Granville Sharp, Esq., was read, and a third 
benefaction of five guineas was voted to the treasurer of the truly noble Committee 
for the Abolition of the Slave Trade, as a further testimony of our high approbation 
of their zealous efforts to remove so great an evil." 

" Northampton and other Churches in Association. 

" Oakham, June 14-15, 1791. 
" It was unanimously voted that five guineas be sent up to the treasurer of the 
Society for Procuring the Abolition of the Slave Trade," &c. A part of the state- 
ment speaks of " the iniquitous, disgraceful practices of slave-dealing and slave- 
holders." , .' . _ 7 

" Baptist Association, \\ ooten-under-edge, 

" June 14-15, 1791. 

"Voted, particularly, a fourth benefaction of five guineas to the Committee for 
Abolishing the Slave Trade." 

Similar minutes are on record of the Northamptonshire Association. 

York and Lancashire Association. — " The ministers, met in association at Salen- 
dine, June 15-16, 1791, send Christian salutations to the several Churches with 
which they are connected" (here follow their names, eighteen in number\ ifcc. 

Then follows a Utter from the ministers to these Churches, urging upon them 
renewed and continued effort in the cause of abolition, adding : " Ye friends of 
humanity, heaven will reward and approve your conduct." 

[See " Facts for Baptist Churches, by A. T. Eoss ami E. Mathews, Utica : Pub- 
lished by the American Baptist Free Mission Society," 1850— a book of 408 pages, 
and containing a mas3 of documentary information, chiefly concerning Baptists in 
America.] 



62 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

the African Slave Trade, in February, 1788. In May of the 
same year, the same subject of inquiry was introduced into 
the House of Commons, by Mr. Pitt, during the sickness of 
Mr. Wilberforce. The investigation was urged by Pitt, Wil- 
berforce, Fox, and Burke, but delayed by opposition, un- 
til, in April, 1791, Mr. Wilberforce moved for leave to bring 
in a bill to prevent the further importation of slaves into the 
colonies. After a long debate, the motion was lost. He re- 
newed his motion in 1792, when an amendment in favor of 
gradual abolition prevailed in the Commons, but was not acted 
upon in the House of Lords. 

"In 1793, Mr. Wilberforce renewed and lost his motion. In 1794, he 
renewed and carried it in the House of Commons, but the House of Lords 
rejected it. In 1795-6, the effort was renewed and negatived. In 1797, 
an address was carried to the king. In 1798-9, Mr. Wilberforce renewed 
his motion, and was defeated, but Dr. Horsley, Bishop of Rochester, in the 
House of Lords, nobly and effectually vindicated Scripture from the blas- 
phemous imputation of tolerating slavery.' 1 ' 1 — Stitarfs Memoir, p. 54. 

So the argument must needs be made against slavery, though 
the proposition was only to abolish the traffic from Africa ! 
And the Bible argument, from the lips of religious teachers, 
must needs precede legislative action. 

From 1799 till 1801, the agitation in Parliament was sus- 
pended ; but, in the mean time, public sentiment appears to 
have undergone a favorable change, and in Parliament the 
cause was strengthened by the accession of the new represen- 
tation from Ireland. 

"In 1801, the bill passed the Commons, but its discussion 
was deferred in the House of Lords. 

''•In 1805, Wilberforce renewed his motion, bat lost it. Mr. 
Pitt, who had thus far fostered the bill, soon after died. 

In 1806, a bill was introduced by Sir Arthur Piggott, to 
give effect to a previous proclamation of the King, restricting 
and crippling, in some particulars, the slave trade. This bill 
passed both houses, whereupon Mr. Fox moved "That the 
House, considering the slave trade to be contrary to the prin- 
ciples of justice, humanity and policy, will, with all practica- 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 63 

blc expedition, take effectual measures for its abolition." — 
" This was carried by a majority of 114 to 15 in the Commons, 
and 41 to 20 in the Lords. Mr. Fox died before the next 
session." 

"In 1807, Lord Granville brought into the House of Lords 
a Bill for the Abolition of the Slave Trade." After mature 
discussion, during which, counsel was heard against it, four 
days, the Bill was passed in the House of Lords, 100 to 36, 
and the LTouse of Commons, 283 to 16. It received, almost 
immediately, the Royal assent. This was March 16th, 1807. 
The bill provided that no vessel should clear out from any 
British port for slaves after the 1st of May, 1807, nor land 
anv in the colonies after the 1st of March, 1808. — Stuart's 
Memoir, p. 54. OlarJcson's Hist, passim. 

Similar action was going on in the Governments of other 
nations, or soon followed. In the United States, a Statute of 
Congress, enacted in 1807, prohibited the importation of 
slaves, after January 1, 1808. In 1818, Congress declared 
the traffic to be piracy. In 1819, the President was author- 
ized to provide for the removal of imported slaves beyond 
the limits of the .United States. 



REVIEW OF THIS STRUGGLE. 

This memorable and protracted struggle is instructive, in 
many respects. Among other things, it shows how blindly 
public men may follow mere technicalities and precedents, 
and how difficult it is to overcome the prejudices associated 
with these, in the effort to restore the reign of impartial law. 
A similar struggle had resulted in the decision of Lord 
Mansfield in the Somerset case, in 1772. The illegality of 
slave holding was then fully established, under the funda- 
mental principles of the British Constitution and Common 
Law, which were not then first brought into existence, but 
had been the same, from the beginning of the slave trade. 
The decision had labeled "illegality" upon the whole 
procedure, from beginning to end, upon the slave trade as 



64 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

well as slavery, upon the past slave trade and slavery as well 
as present, so far as the principle involved was concerned. 
To have admitted that there had been, or then was, any 
legality in the slave trade, under that same British Constitu- 
tion and Common Law, would have been, in effect, to have 
impugned the decision of Lord Mansfield in the Somerset 
case, and to have set it aside as erroneous. No one thought 
of attempting this. And yet, strange to tell, the then present 
legality of the slave trade appears to have been taken for 
granted, on all hands, at the commencement of this long strug- 
gle for its Parliamentary suppression. 

It is curious to observe, that while in America, at the pre- 
sent time, slave holding is held to be legal and not disreputa- 
ble, and yet the slave trade is branded as piracy ; the corres- 
ponding prejudice in England took an opposite direction; 
insomuch that slave holding was considered a high crime, 
while around the slave trade was supposed to cluster all the 
sacred sanctions and guaranties of obligatory and valid law ! 

It was not until this falsehood was ferrited out of its hiding 
places, dragged into daylight, and dissected by Mr. Pitt, that 
the power of the slave trade, in the Parliament, was broken, 
and the charm of its invincibility, as an interest fostered by 
the Government, was dissolved. 

To every thing that could be urged by the eloquence of 
Wilberforce, against the wickedness, the injustice, the inhu- 
manity, the cruelty, the impolicy, and the blighting effects of 
the slave trade, the ready answer of the interested opposition 
was, the legality of the traffic, the sacred and inviolable guar- 
anties, the legal inheritance, the patrimonial rights of the par- 
ties concerned, and especially of the West India planters, who 
were supposed to need further supplies of slaves. 

In answer to Mr. Dundas, who, for the fortieth time, per- 
haps, had been parrying off Parliamentary proceedings, by 
urging pleas of this sort, Mr. Pitt, upon whose vision new 
light on the subject appears to have suddenly gleamed, rose 
up, astonished the House, and overwhelmed his antagonist by 
a bold denial of the legality of the slave trade, under any sup- 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 65 

posed laws of the realm I He proceeded to dash in shivers 
the flimsy pretext, in a manner that precluded all attempts at 
reply. 

"Any contract," he said, "for the promotion of this trade must, in his 
opinion, have been VOID FROM THE BEGINNING, for if it was an 
outrage upon justice, and only another name for fraud, robbery, and murder, 
what pledge could devolve on the legislature to incur the obligation of 
becoming principals in the commission of such enormities, by sanctioning 
their continuance ! 

" But he would appeal to the acts themselves. That of 23 George II., 
c. 31, was the one upon which the greatest stress was laid. How would the 
House be surprised to hear that these very outrages committed in the pro- 
secution of this trade had been forbidden by that act ! ' No master of a 
ship trading to Africa,' says the act, ' shall, by fraud, force, or violence, or 
by any indirect practice whatever, take on board or carry away from that 
coast any Negro, or native of that country, or commit any violence upon 
the natives, to the prejudice of said trade ; and every person so offending 
shall, for every such offence, forfeit one hundred pounds.' But the whole 
trade had been demonstrated to be a system of fraud and violence, and 
therefore the contract was daily violated under which the Parliament 
allowed it to continue.'''' — Clarksorfs History, p. 314. 

Thus was the notion of the legality of the slave trade ex- 
ploded, (as that of the legality of slavery had previously been) 
and the mind of the British nation forever emancipated from 
that ensnaring and enslaving delusion. Thenceforward the 
real question was, how that lawless traffic could be suppressed 
and terminated. 

ABOLITION OF THE SLAVE TRADE ABORTIVE. 

One of the most instructive though mortifying lessons to 
be deduced from this history, as expounded in the light of its 
results, is the utter futility of all attempts to suppress the 
slave trade, without breaking up the market, by the abolition 
of slavery itself. So slow have philanthropists been to learn 
this plain lesson, that, during one entire human generation, 
the glorious abolition of the African slave trade was celebra- 
ted by public demonstrations, by orators, by poets, by histo- 
rians, in almost universal inattention to the fact, that the slave 

5 



08 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

trade, though prohibited by law, was increasing, both in ex- 
tent and in cruelty, amid all this misplaced gratulation and 
triumph. 

Disregarding chronological order, for a few moments, we 
must leap over a chasm of thirty-five years, to witness the 
historical confirmation of Granville Sharp's solemn protest 
against the deplorable error of the Committee. 

Mr. Clarkson lived to see and to retract the error. As Presi- 
dent of the Anti-Slavery Society, in 1845, he addressed a let- 
ter to Lord Aberdeen, on the mode of suppressing the traffic, 
in which he solemnly affirmed, " that by the total abolition of 
slavery only, can the slave trade be annihilated." This view 
was "sustained by the high authority of Lord John Russell, 
who, when Colonial Minister, addressed a communication to 
the Lords Commissioners of Her Majesty's Treasury, in which 
he says, — ' To repress the Foreign Slave Trade by a marine 
guard would scarcely be possible.' " This view was afterwards 
amply sustained by evidence before a Select Committee of 
Parliament, and embodied in two Reports presented to the 
House of Commons, showing not only the increase and the 
horrors of the Slave Traffic, but the utter inefficiency of an 
armed force for its suppression. A number of Commanders 
in the Royal Navy, employe! in that service, gave explicit 
testimony to that import, and that the horrors of the middle 
passage and the miseries of the slaves are greatly aggravated 
by the efforts to suppress the traffic. The reason, as stated by 
the witnesses, is obvious. The trade, after deducting losses 
by deaths on the passage, yields a profit of about 200 per 
cent, on the investment ! The amount of re-captures, though 
very great, and indicating the vast extent and briskness of 
the traffic, is only from four to ten per cent, of the estimated 
amount of shipments, and consequently interposes no serious 
check to the business. Yet the danger of capture induces 
the use of smaller vessels, in order to escape more easily the 
cruisers, and the consequent crowding of the slaves into a 
much smaller space. 

The picture of the middle passage, in former times, as drawn 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 67 

by Mr. Mann, (already quoted,) falls short of the reality, as 
existing at j^'csent. It was testified that " in Brazil the num- 
ber of slaves imported are now beyond what they were before 
Great Britain first used her efforts to put down the trade." 
Between 60,000 and 65,000 were computed to have been 
landed alive in Brazil, in the year 1847, after a loss of 85,000 
by deaths, on the passage. In short, " the horrors of the 
slave trade appear to increase, just in proportion to the rigor 
used for its suppression." The French and American squad- 
rons have, however, done little or nothing for the suppression. 
And, under cover of the American flag, which, by treaty, the 
British cruisers are prohibited from molesting, the slavers, of 
whatever nation frequently defeat the object of the British 
cruisers. The whole number of slaves computed to have been 
exported from Africa, westward, in 1788, was 100,000. The 
annual export from 1798 to 1805 was computed at 85,000. 
For the year 1847, it was computed at 88,000. This shows 
that the decrease of the slave trade since the first organized 
agitation on the subject has not kept equal pace with the ex- 
tent to which slavery itself has been abolished, diminishing 
the field resorted to as a market. In other words, if slavery 
now existed, as it recently did, in the British West Indies, in 
Mexico, and all the South American countries, we should wit- 
ness a greater amount of slave exportations from Africa than 
in 1788. This is confirmed by the fact that in 1825, such was 
actually the case, the exportations for that year having been 
computed at 125,000, and from some causes, the average of 
exportations from 1835 to 18-10, inclusive, were computed at 
135,000.* Towards the close of this period, Thomas Fowell 
Buxton, Esq., Member of Parliament, wrote an account of the 
African slave trade, in which he says : 

" It has been proved, by documents which cannot be controverted, that 
for every village tired, and every drove of human beings marched, in former 
times, there are now double. For every cargo then at sea, two cargoes, 

* See Annual Reports of the British and Foreign Anti -Slavery Society, for 1847 
and 1848 ; also, the (British) Anti-Slavery Reporter, for August 1, 1848, containing an 
abstract of the evidence before the Select Committee of Parliament. 



68 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

or twice the number in one cargo, wedged together, in a mass of living cor- 
ruption, are now borne on the wave of the Atlantic." — Buxton's Slave 
Trade, p. 159. 

But the efforts of philanthropists for the abolition of the 
African slave trade were not wholly in vain. They demon- 
strated the necessity of abolishing slavery itself. They branded 
with the infamy of piracy the African slave trade, and, by 
unavoidable implication, the same traffic everywhere else, 
thus striking at the very idea of human chattelhood throughout 
the world. If the process of teaching these truths has been a 
slow one, it has nevertheless been effective. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 69 



CHAPTER VIIL 

PERIOD OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION, AND THE ESTABLISH- 
MENT OF AN INDEPENDENT GOVERNMENT. 

Natural Tendencies of the Revolutionary Struggle — Its principle educed from pre- 
vious Anti-Slavery Discussion — Originated in the States least influenced by 
Slavery — First Congress (1774) — Action in favor of " the abolition of Domestic 
Slavery''' — Resolutions against the Slave Trade — Previous action in Provincial and 
Local Conventions — In North Carolina and Virginia — "Articles of Association" 
against Slave Trade — Concurrent Action in Georgia, Maryland, Virginia, and Con- 
necticut — Anti-Slavery Literature of 177(5 — Implied illegality of Slavery — Decla- 
ration of Independence — The unanimous act of the Thirteen United States — 
" The Union" formed then, and not by the Federal Constitution of 1789 — John Q. 
Adams — This Declaration equivalent to a Constitution of Government — State 
Constitutions — Articles of Confederation (1778) make no compromise with Slavery 
— Sentiments published by order of Congress (1779) — Jefferson's Notes on Vir- 
ginia — Peace of 1783 — Address of Congress to the States — Sentiments of promi- 
nent Statesmen — Legislation in Virginia. 

The state of the slave question in America, from about the 
time of the commencement of the Revolution in 1774, till the 
adoption of the Federal Constitution in 1789, requires to be 
correctly understood, in order to any trustworthy estimate of 
the bearing of our political institutions upon the present 
existence of slavery. 

It was by no accidental coincidence that the period of the 
Revolution was the period of a more general and deep seated 
opposition to slavery than had been before visible, or than 
has been witnessed since. The religious sentiment against 
slavery, as a violation of heaven established rights, a senti- 
ment that had been rising for some time previous, and that 
was now beginning to reach the point of disfellowship with 
slave-holders, was a sentiment that naturally assimilated itself 



70 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN" 

with the rising opposition to the British Government for its 
invasions of the same sacred rights ; and that as naturally- 
sought the same remedy ; to wit, the separation of freedom 
from the embraces of despotic power. A spirit of liberty, 
humanity, and justice, in the church, may be regarded as the 
best foundation for the establishment of liberty, humanity, 
and justice in the State,* and a proper regard for the rights 
of others will ever be found essential to a healthful jealousy 
and timely vindication of our own. 

It is equally evident that the rising opposition of the com- 
munity in general to the despotic assumptions of the British. 
Government, so far as it had anything in it like a manly re- 
gard to free principles for its basis, compelled that community 
to look at the more grievous wrongs of the slaves, and created 
an earnest sympathy in their favor. A decent regard to self- 
consistency, in that unsophisticated and earnest age, could 
scarcely fail to produce some such effects. The only just 
ground for regret or astonishment is that the spirit of freedom 
then seeming to be in the ascendant, did not secure and main- 
tain a more complete and permanent triumph. 

It is instructive to notice how the spirit of republican liber- 
ty and independence, in the different colonies, was found most 
predominant and most efficient, precisely where there were 



* It may bo doubted by some whether the religious sentiment and the testimony 
and action of religious bodies against slavery in this country, had been sufficiently 
extensive to make any very deep impression either upon the public conscience, in 
general, or upon the minds of our prominent statesmen. But the power of such 
influences is greater than is commonly understood. True statesmen, and even 
shrewd politicians, always keep themselves informed in respect to the religious ten- 
dencies of a country. Especially was this true in the last century. There can be 
no doubt that such men as Jefferson and Madison were familiarly acquainted with 
all that theologians in this country and Europe had written concerning slavery. 

The letter of Patrick Henry to Robert Pleasants (afterwards President of the 
Virginia Abolition Society), written Jan. 18, 1773, sufficiently shows that his mind 
had been deeply affected with the movements among the " Friends." 

"Believe me," says he, "I shall honor the Quakers for their noble efforts to 
abolish slavery. It is a debt that we owe to the purity of our religion to show that 
it is at variance with that law that warrants slavery. I exhort you to persevere iu 
so worthy a resolution." " I believe a time will come when an opportunity will be 
offered to abolish this lamentable evil." 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 71 

fewest slaves, and where the spirit of opposition to slavery 
was likewise most efficient and most predominant; while th< 
regions most deeply involved in the sin of slaveholding and 
least accessible to the principles of emancipation, were pre- 
cisely the same regions in which the apologists and partizans 
of British usurpation were most numerous and influential — 
the regions in which the spirit of opposition to that usurpation 
was, to the smallest extent, and with the greatest difficulty 
roused. The South was overrun with tories, while New Eng- 
land was united in favor 1 of independence, almost to a man. 
Particular localities at the North, might be mentioned, where 
the prevalence of slaveholding and slave trading was connected 
with a corresponding sympathy with despotic government. 

It may be added, that the names most prominent in the 
Revolutionary struggle were also among the names most 
prominent in opposition to slavery, and it is not known that a 
single advocate of the abolition of slavery was otherwise thai: 
a firm asserter of the rights of the Colonies. 

That the subsequent decline of the spirit of general liberty 
and the corresponding decline of opposition to slavery, have 
steadily gone hand in hand, until the propagandists of inter- 
minable slavery have derided the self-evident truths of the 
Declaration of Independence, and the people of the free State? 
have listened with comparative apathy, are equally undeni- 
able facts. 

A full and correct history of the American Revolution, and 
of the incipient and successive steps taken to unite the 
Colonies under a new government, cannot fail to identify the 
movement with opposition to slavery, and the purpose and 
anticipation of its overthrow. A few documentary facts, in 
illustration, must suffice here. 

The first general Congress of the Colonies assembled in 
Philadelphia, in September, 1774. Preparatory to that mea- 
sure, the Convention of Virginia assembled in August of 
that year, to appoint delegates to the general Congress. An 
exposition of the rights of British America, by Mr. Jefferson. 



72 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

was laid before this Convention, of which the following is an 
extract : 

" The abolition of domestic slavery is the greatest object of desire 
in these Colonies, where it was unhappily introduced in their infant state. 
But previous to the enfranchisement of the slaves, it is necessary to exclude 
further importations from Africa. Yet our repeated attempts to effect this 
by prohibitions, and by imposing duties which might amount to prohibition, 
have been hitherto defeated by his Majesty's negative; thus preferring the 
immediate advantage of a few African corsairs to the lasting interests of the 
American States, and the rights of human nature, deeply wounded by this 
infamous practice." — Am. Archives, 4th series, Vol. I., p. 696. 

The Virginia Convention, before separating, adopted the 
following resolution : 

" Resolved, We will neither ourselves import nor purchase any slave or 
slaves imported by any other person after the first day of November next, 
either from Africa, the West Indies, or any other place." — lb. p. 687. 

Similar resolutions, had been adopted by primary meetings 
of the people in county meetings throughout Virginia, during 
the month of July preceding the State Convention. At the 
meeting in Fairfax county, Washington was chairman. 

North Carolina also held her Provincial Convention in 
August, of the same year. Nearly every county in the State 
was represented. There were sixty-nine delegates. The 
following resolution was adopted: 

" Resolved, That we will not import any slave or slaves, or purchase any 
slave or slaves imported or brought into the Province by others, from any 
part of the world, after the first day of November next." — lb., p. 735. 

Similar resolutions had been previously adopted in primary 
meetings of the citizens hi other Southern provinces, now 
States. 

It was after such demonstrations that the first General Con- 
gress assembled. Their first and main work was the formation 
of the " Association " .which formed a bond of Union between 
the Colonies. This was nearly two years before the Declaration 
of Independence, so that " the Union " of the future States was 
effected before their Independence, a fact subversive of the 
common theory of the Constitution, which supposes inde- 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 73 

pendent States first, and a compromise of the slave question, 
in order to the effecting of a Union, afterwards. The follow- 
ing extracts from the articles of Association will show the 
principles and the terms, so far as the slave question is con- 
cerned, upon which this first union was effected : 

"We do, for ourselves and the inhabitants of the several Colonies whom 
we represent, firmly agree and associate under the sacred ties of virtue, 

honor, and love of our country, as follows : 

* * * * * * * 

2. "That we will neither import nor purchase any slave import- 
ed alter rhe first day of December next ; after which time we will wholly 
discontinue the slave trade, and will neither be concerned in it ourselves, 
nor will we hire our vessels, nor sell our commodities or manufactures, to 

those who are concerned in«it." 

* * * * * * * 

11. "That a committee be chosen in every county, city, and town, by 
those who are qualified to vote for Representatives in the Legislature, whose 
business it shall be attentively to observe the conduct of all persons touching 
this Association ; and when it shall be made to appear, to the satisfaction of 
a majority of any such committee, that any person within the limits of their 
appointment has violated this Association, that such majority do forthwith 
cause the truth of the case to be published in the gazette, to the end that all 
such foes to the rights of British America may be publicly known, and 
universally contemned as the enemies of American liberty ; and thence- 
forth we respectively will break off all dealings with him or her." 

* * * * * * * 

14 " And we do further agree and resolve that we will have no trade, 
commerce, dealings, or intercourse whatever, with any colony or province 
in North America, which shall not accede to, or which shall hereafter 
violate this Association, but will hold them as unworthy of the rights of 
freemen, and as inimical to the liberties of this country." 

* * * * *. * * 

" The foregoing Association, being determined upon by the Congress, 
was ordered to be subscribed by the several members thereof ; and there- 
upon, we have hereunto set our respective names accordingly. 
In Congress, Philadelphia, October 20, 1774. 

PEYTON RANDOLPH, 

President. 

New Hampshire— John Sullivan, Nathaniel Folsom. 
Massachusetts Bay — Thomas Gushing, Samuel Adams, John Adams, 
Robert Treat Paine. 

Rhode Island — Stephen Hopkins, Samuel Ward. 



74 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

Connecticut — Eliphalet Dyer, Roger Sherman, Silas Deane. 

New York — Isaac Low, John Alsop, John Jay, James Duane, Philip 
Livingston, William Floyd, Henry Wisner, Simon Boerum. 

New Jersey — James Kinsey, William Livingston, Stephen Crane, 
Richard Smith, John De Hart. 

Pennsylvania — Joseph Galloway, John Dickinson, Charles Humphreys, 
Thomas Mifflin, Edward Biddle, John Morton, George Ross. 

The lower counties, Newcastle, &c. — Caesar Rodney, Thomas 
McKean, George Read. 

Maryland — Matthew Tilghman, Thomas Johnson, jr., W T illiam Paca, 
Samuel Chase. 

Virginia — Richard Henry Lee, George Washington, Patrick Henry, jr., 
Richard Bland, Benjamin Harrison, Edmund Pendleton. 

North Carolina — William Hooper, Joseph Hewes, Richard Caswell. 

South Carolina — Henry Middleton, Thomas^ Lynch, Christopher Gads- 
den, John Rutledge, Edward Rutledge. — American Archives, 4th Series, 
p. 915. 

Such, was the action of the first American Congress. These 
were items in the " Articles of Association." How thej were 
received in the Colonies will appear from the following : 

" We, therefore, the Representatives of the extensive District of Darien, 
in the colony of Georgia, having now assembled in Congress, by authority 
and free choice of the inhabitants of said District, now freed from their 
fetters, do resolve : 

" 5. To show the world that we are not influenced by any contracted or 
interested motives, but a general philanthropy for all mankind, of what- 
ever climate, language, or complexion, we hereby declare our disapprobation 
and abhorrence of the unnatural practice of slavery in America, (however 
the uncultivated state of our country, or other specious arguments may 
plead for it,) a practice founded in injustice and cruelty, and highly danger- 
ous to our liberties, (as well as lives,) debasing part of our fellow-creatures 
below men, and corrupting the virtue and morals of the rest, and is laying 
the basis of that liberty we contend for, (and which we pray the Almighty 
to continue to the latest posterity,) upon a very wrong foundation. We, 
therefore, Resolve, at all times to use our utmost endeavors for the manu- 
mission of our slaves in this colony, upon the most safe and equitable foot- 
ing for the master and themselves." — Jan. 12th, 1775. — Ibid., p. 1136. 

The following action was taken by the Convention of Mary- 
land, held in November, 1774, and re-adopted by a Conven- 
tion more fully attended, in December : 

" Resolved, That every member of this meeting will, and every person in 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 75 

the province should, strictly and inviolably observe and carry into execution 
the Association agreed on by the Continental Congress." 

The declaration adopted by a general meeting of the free- 
holders in James City county, in Virginia, in November, 1774, 
is in these words : 

" The Association entered into by Congress being publicly read, the free- 
holders and other inhabitants of the county, that they might testify to the 
world their concurrence and hearty approbation of the measures adopted by 
that respectable body, very cordially acceded thereto, and did bind and oblige 
themselves, by the sacred ties of virtue, honor, and love to their country, 
strictly and inviolably to observe and keep the same in every particular." 

The proceedings of a town meeting at Danbury, Connec- 
ticut, Dec. 12th, 1774, contained the following : 

" It is with singular pleasure we notice the second article of the Asso- 
ciation, in which it is agreed to import no more negro slaves, as we cannot 
but think it a palpable absurdity so loudly to complain of attempts to enslave 
us while we are actually enslaving others." — Am. Archives, 4th series, Vol. 
I., p. 1038. 

These are but " specimens of the formal and solemn declarations of 
public bodies." " The Articles of Association were adopted by Colonial 
Conventions, County Meetings, and lesser assemblages throughout the coun- 
try, and became the law of America — the fundamental Constitution, so to 
speak, of the first American Union." " The Union thus constituted was, to 
be sure, imperfect, partial, incomplete, but it was still a Union, a union of 
the Colonies and of the people for the great objects set forth in the articles. 
And let it be remembered, also, that prominent in the list of measures agreed 
on in these articles, was the discontinuance of the slave trade, with a view 
to the ultimate extinction of slavery itself."* 

That this "sentiment pervaded the masses of the people/' 
and that they understood themselves as laying the constitutional 
foundations of a permanent union and general government by 
these measures, may be seen by the following extracts from 
an eloquent paper, entitled "Observations addressed to the 
people of America," printed at Philadelphia, in Nov., 1774: 

* Speech of Hon. S. P. Chase, of Ohio, U. S. Senate, March 26, 1S50. To this 
speech, and to that of Hon. Lewis D. Campbell, of Ohio, in the House of Represen- 
tatives of the U. S., Feb. 19, 1850, we are indebted for the quotations made from the 
American Archives. 



76 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

" The least deviation from the resolves of Congress will be treason ; 
such treason as few villains have ever had an opportunity of committing. 
It will be treason against the present inhabitants of the colonies — against 
the millions of unborn generations who are to exist hereafter in America — 
against the only liberty and happiness which remain to mankind — against 
the last hopes of the wretched in every corner of the world ; in a word, it 
will be treason against God. * * * We are now laying the foun- 
dations of an American Constitution. Let us, therefore, hold up 
everything we do to the eye of posterity. They will most probably mea- 
sure their liberties and happiness by the most careless of our footsteps. 
Let no unhallowed hand touch the precious seed of liberty. Let us form 
the glorious tree in such a manner, and impregnate it with such principles 
of life, that it shall last forever. * . * * I almost wish to live to hear 
the triumphs of the jubilee in the year 1874 ; to see the models, pictures, 
fragments of writings, that shall be displayed to revive the memory of the 
proceedings of the Congress of 1774. If any adventitious circumstance 
shall give precedency on that day, it shall be to inherit the blood, or even 
to possess the name, of a member of that glorious assembly." — Amer. 
Arch., 4 ser., vol. i, p. 976. 

The spirit of 1774 was not extinct or languishing in 1776, 
a year memorable not only for the Declaration of American 
Independence, but for the previous enunciation of the same 
self-evident truths, applied to the sin of slavery, in a more 
elaborate and thorough elucidation of the whole subject than 
had before appeared.* The argument of Dr. Hopkins against 
slavery is introduced by a notice of the action of Congress 
against the slave trade, and the statement that the traffic "has 
now but few advocates, and is generally exploded and con- 
demned." The treatise contains the remarkable statement 
that " the slavery that now takes place," (in distinction from 
that of ancient times,) is " xoiiliout the express sanction of civil 
government.''^ This idea will now appear strange to most per- 



* " A Dialogue concerning the Slavery of the Africans, showing it to be the duty 
and interest of the American States to emancipate all their African Slaves. Dedi- 
cated to the Honorable the Continental Congress." By Samuel Hopkins, D.D., of 
Newport, R. I. 

t The same idea seems involved in another portion of the treatise. "The 
several legislatures in these colonies," says the writer, "the magistrates and the 
body of the people, have doubtless been greatly guilty in approving and encour- 
aging, or at least conniving at, this practice" (i. e., slaveholding). 

This is certainly remarkable language, especially from so accurate and discrimin- 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 77 

sons. But the careful and reflecting reader of the history we 
have given in the preceding chapters, will have been led to 
inquire when and Jwiv the "express sanction," of "civil gov- 
ernment" had been given to slavery in any form that could 
entitle it to the reputation of being legalized. The decision 
of Lord Mansfield in the Somerset case, four years previous, 
may have been in the mind of Hopkins, and he is known to 
have been in correspondence with Granville Sharp, with 
whose views the reader is acquainted. "What seems most re- 
markable is, that a treatise containing such a statement should 
not only have been extensively circulated without being 
questioned, but republished, and still more extensively circu- 
lated, nine years afterwards, by anti-slavery societies under 
the auspices of such statesmen as Franklin and Jay. If it be 
conceded that American slavery was "without the express 
sanction of civil government," that it was not, in a strict and 
proper sense, legalized, at the time when Hopkins wrote his 
treatise, a few months before the Declaration of Independence, 
it would be a curious question how it could have become 
legalized since. Assuredly, the far-famed Declaration of in- 
alienable human rights cannot have given it any new validity ! 

" We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal ; 
that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, 
among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." u To secure 
these rights, governments are instituted among men." " We, therefore, 
the representatives of the United States of America," &c. &c. 

"We enter into no argument here concerning the legal effect 
of that immortal Declaration, upon the tenure of slave proper- 
ty. But it is important to note down distinctly the historical 
facts. It was the " unanimous Declaration of the thirteen 
United (not disunited) States of America." The " Union " 
had already been formed, and has never since been dissolved. 



ativc a writer as Hopkins, if slavery were universally and unhesitatingly held to bo 
legal. Legislatures and magistrates are not commonly spoken of as " conniving'''' 
(closing their eyes upon) practices which are admitted to be legal ! Such language 
describes their culpable neglect to suppress and punish practices that are unlawful. 



78 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN" 

On this point, there can be no mistake.* It was not only a 
Declaration of the States by their delegates, but was separately 
ratified by all the States, afterwards, and has never been re- 
pudiated or repealed since. In connection with the previous 
Articles of Association, it was the only constitution of the 
United States, until the adoption of the " Articles of Confeder- 
ation" in 1778 ; and with these, thenceforward, until the adop- 
tion of the present Federal Constitution, in 1789. It had 
power to legalize Acts of Congress and Treaties, as also to 
absolve citizens from their allegiance to the king of Great 
Britain.f Its repeal would have been an abandonment of In- 
dependence, and a return to the condition of colonies. 

Besides this, the original thirteen States, except Connecti- 
cut and Rhode Island, formed Constitutions bearing date, 
variously, from 1776 to 1783. " They generally recognized, 
in some form or other, the natural rights of men, as one of the 
fundamental principles of the government. Several of them 
asserted these rights in the most emphatic and authoritative 
manner." So that the fundamental principles and self-evident 
truths of the Declaration of 1776 became the constitutional 
law of the several States. Vide Spooner, p. 46. 

The Articles of Confederation, formed in 1778, contained 
no recognition of slavery, nor of distinctions of color. It was 
never pretended that, under these articles, the slaveholder 
whose slaves had escaped to another State, had any legal 
power to force him back. 

In 1779 the Continental Congress ordered a pamphlet to be 
published, entitled, " Observations on the American Revolu- 
tion," of which the following is an extract : 

" The great principle (of government) is and ever will remain in force, 

* The reader 13 referred to the unanswered and unanswerable argument of John 
Quincy Adams on this point, in his address at Newburyport, 4th of July, 1837. 

t John Hancock, President of Congress, in a letter to the Convention of New 
Jersey, then in session, and inclosing a copy of the Declaration of Independence, 
speaks of it as being " the ground and foundation of a future government." If the 
"ground and foundation" be removed, what becomes of the superstructure? But 
if this "ground and foundation" remains, what becomes of the validity of slave 
laws ? 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 79 

that men arc, by nature, free ; as accountable to Him that made them, they 
must be so ; and so long as we have any idea of divine justice, we must 
associate that of human freedom. Whether men can part with their 
liberty, is among the questions which have exercised the ablest writers; 
but it is conceded, on all hands, that the right to be free can never be 
alienated ; still less is it practicable for one generation to mortgage the 
privileges of another.'''' 

A more forcible denial of the possibility of legalizing slavery 
could not easily have been penned. 

About this time, or not long after, Mr. Jefferson wrote his 
celebrated Notes on Virginia, in which his testimonies against 
slavery are so various and emphatic, that we hesitate what 
paragraph to select for quotation. The following serves to 
show what such men, at that time, expected and desired to 
see accomplished, and what was then, in Mr. Jefferson's 
opinion, the state of sentiment in the Southern States. 

" I think a change is already perceptible since the origin of the present 
revolution. The spirit of the master is abating, that of the slave is rising 
from the dust, his condition mollifying, the way, I hope, preparing, under 
the auspices of heaven, for a total emancipation." 

General Gates, the conqueror of Burgoyne, emancipated, in 
1780, his numerous slaves. 

From the beginning to the close of the war, one uniform 
language was held. Soon after the peace of 1783, Con- 
gress issued an address to the States, drawn up by Mr. Madi- 
son, a main object of which was to ask the provision of funds 
to discharge the public engagements. The plea is thus urged : 

" Let it be remembered, finally, that it has ever been the pride and boast 
of America that the rights for which she contended were the rights of 
human nature. By the blessing of the Author of these rights on the means 
exerted for their defence, they have prevailed against all opposition, and 
form the basis of thirteen independent States." 

The expression of similar sentiments did not then cease, 
nor were they confined to public acts. 

"Jefferson, Pendleton, Mason, Wythe, and Lee, while acting as a com- 
mittee of the House of Delegates of Virginia, to revise the State Laws, 
prepared a plan for the gradual emancipation of the slaves, by law." 

In addition to these, " Grayson, St. George Tucker, Madison, Blair, Page, 
Parker, Edmund Randolph, Iredell, Spaight, Ramsey, McIIcnry, Samuel 



80 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

Chase, and nearly all the illustrious names south of the Potomac, proclaimed 
it before the sun, that the days of slavery were beginning to be num- 
bered. 1 ' — Poiver of Congress over the "District of Columbia,'''' by T. D. 
Weld. 

But it is needless to multiply these references. So universal 
were these sentiments, that Mr. Leigh, in the Convention 
of Virginia, in 1832, took occasion to say : 

" I thought, till very lately, that it was known to every body that, during 
the Revolution, and for many years after, the abolition of slavery was a 
favorite topic with many of our ablest statesmen, who entertained with re- 
spect all the schemes which wisdom or ingenuity could suggest for its 
accomplishment." 

Mr. Faulkner, in the same Convention, alluded to the same 
fact, as did also Gov. Barbour, of Virginia, in the United 
States' Senate, in 1820. 

These professions of the fathers of our republic were not 
totally unaccompanied with corresponding action. 

The articles of Association, including the solemn pledge to 
discontinue the slave trade, appear to have been generally 
respected and observed. That there were unprincipled men 
who evaded or transgressed them, as there were other traitors 
to the cause of liberty, there can be no doubt. After the close 
of the war, this is known to have been the fact. But the 
States took early measures for its suppression. 

" The first opportunity was taken, after the Declaration of Independence, 
to extinguish the detestable commerce so long forced upon the province 
(Virginia). In October, 1778, during the tumult and anxiety of the Revolu- 
tion, the General Assembly passed a law, prohibiting, under heavy penalties, 
the further importation of slaves, and declaring that every slave imported 
thereafter, should be immediately set free." " The example of Virginia 
was followed, at different times, before the date of the Federal Constitution, 
by most of the other States." — Walsh's " Appeal" — Vide " Friend of 
Man," June 21, 1837. Copied from " Human Rights.''' 

" We are not aware that any State allowed the importation of slaves at 
the time," when the Constitution was adopted. " The first State that re- 
newed the traffic, so far as we know, was S. Carolina." in 1803. — " Human 
Rights" — " F. of Man, 1 ' as above. 

Under what influences, and with what activity, the slave 
trade was resumed, from 1803 to 1808, will be shown in the 
proper place. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 81 



CHAPTER IX. 

ERA OF FORMING THE FEDERAL CONSTITUTION. 

Prevailing Sentiment — Washington— Lather Martyn — William Pinokney— North- 
western Territory— Ordinance of 1787 — Madison — " Understandings"— Wilson — 
Heath— Johnson— Randolph— Patrick Henry— Iredell— " The Federalist," by Jay, 
Madison, and Hamilton — Ratifications — Rhode Island — Now York — Virginia — 
North < larolina — Amendment — " Due process of law." 

From the close of the Revolutionary war in 1783, to the 
sitting of the Constitutional Convention, was a space of only 
four y ears. Thence, two more } r ears bring us to the adoption 
of the Constitution, in 1789. What was the prevailing senti- 
ment of that period? 

In a letter to Robert Morris, dated Mount Vernon, April 12* 1786, George 
Washington said : 

" I can only say that there is not a man living who wishes more sincerely 
than I do to see a plan adopted for the abolition of it, (slavery ;) but there is 
only one proper and effectual mode in which it can be accomplished, and 
that is by legislative authority ; and this, so far as my suffrage will go, shall 
never be wanting." — 9 Spat-ks's Washington, 158. 

In a letter to John F. Mercer, September 9, 1786, he reiterated this 
sentiment : 

" I never mean, unless some particular circumstances should compel me to 
"it, to possess another slave by purchase, it being among my first wishes to 
see some plan adopted, by which slavery in this country may be abolished 
by law." — Ibid. 

And in a letter to Sir John Sinclair, he further said : 

" There are in Pennsylvania laws for the gradual abolition of slavery, 
which neither Virginia nor Maryland have at present, but which nothing is 
more certain than they must have, and at a period not remote." 

By his last will and testament he made all his slaves free. 

6 



82 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

The testimonies of Franklin, Kush, and Jay, in strong op- 
position to slavery, have been cited in another connection.* 

We have now traced the history of the " peculiar institu- 
tion " down to the time when the Federal Constitution was 
about to be formed. Exceedingly " peculiar " indeed, are the 
vouchers for its authenticity and legality down to that point 
in our national histor}'. What occurred while the Federal 
Constitution was in process of forming, is the next historical 
fact to be inquired after. What was likely to have occurred, 
and even, indeed, what could have occurred, may well nigh be 
read in the mere light of the historical facts already noticed. 
Those facts, at least, should not be left out of the account, in 
any attempts at a historical exposition of the Constitution, if, 
indeed, the advocates of the "institution" adventure into 
the field of history at all, in defence of their claims. The 
simple history, and not the argument, must occupy, at present, 
our attention, and yet it is in the light of the pending contro- 
versy that we should ponder the facts. It is that contest that 
gives them their value, and they should be collected, arranged 
and studied with a view to the points to be illustrated and 
determined by them. 

Luther Martin, of Maryland, advocated the abolition of 
slavery, in the Federal Convention of 1787, and in his Eeport 
of the proceedings of that Convention to the Legislature of 
his own State. 

William Pinckney, of Maryland, in the House of Delegates 
in that State, in 1789, urged, strongly, the abolition of slavery. 
We will give but a specimen of his language on that occasion. 

" Sir — Iniquitous and most dishonorable to Maryland, is that dreary 
system of partial bondage which her laws have hitherto supported with a 
solicitude worthy of a better object, and her citizens by their practice, 
countenanced. Founded in a disgraceful traffic, to which the parent 
country lent its fostering aid, from motives of interest, but which even she 
would have disdained to encourage, had England been the destined mart of 
such inhuman merchandize, its continuance is as shameful as its origin/' 

* Chapter IV. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 83 



NORTU- WESTERN TERRITORY — ORDINANCE OF 1787. 

While the Convention for drafting the Constitution of the 
United States was in session, in 1787, the Old Congress passed 
an ordinance abolishing slavery in the North- Western Terri- 
tory, and precluding its future introduction there. The first 
Congress under the new Constitution ratified this ordinance, 
by ;i special act. It received the approval of Washington, 
who was then fresh from the discussions of the Convention 
for drafting the Federal Constitution. The measure originated 
with Jefferson, and its ratification in the new Congress received 
the vote of every member except Mr. Yates, of New York, 
the entire Southern delegation voting for its adoption. By this 
ordinance slavery was excluded from Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, 
Michigan, Wisconsin, and Iowa. 

The series of articles is preceded by this preamble : 

"And for extending the fundamental principles of civil and religious 
liberty, which form the basis whereon these republics, their laws and con- 
stitutions, are erected ; to fix and establish those principles as the basis of 
all laws, constitutions, and governments, which forever hereafter shall be 
formed in said Territory ; to provide also for the establishment of States, 
and permanent government therein, and for their admission to a share in 
the Federal Councils at as early a period as may be consistent with the 
general interest : — Be it ordained and established," &c. &c. 

Then follow the articles. The sixth is as follows : 

" There shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, otherwise than 
in the punishment of crimes, whereof the party shall have been duly con- 
victed ; provided, always, that any person escaping into the same, from 
whom labor or service may be lawfully claimed, in any one of the original 
States, such fugitive may be lawfully reclaimed, and conveyed to the person 
claiming his or her labor or service, as aforesaid.'" 

"The Constitution," it is claimed, "guaranties slavery." 
And "the compromises of the Constitution" are very gene- 
rally conceded, even among those who disrelish and contro- 
vert the claim. We enter not now into matters of. mere 
opinion. But the continuity and fidelity of the history we 
have attempted, compel us to attend to ike facts. 



8-4 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

Whatever those facts are, they are such as are interlinked, 
indissolubly, with the historical facts of the last previous 
chapter, and the preceding ones. History must be understood, 
if at all, in its connections. 

The Constitution is in the hands of the people. We need 
not copy here its provisions. No claimant of the Constitu- 
tional guaranties of slavery adventures to rest the claim on 
the mere words of that instrument. He well knows that 
neither the terms "slave" nor "slavery" are to be found 
there. He goes out of the instrument for its exposition, and 
reposes on supposed facts, in the shape of "understandings" 
then entertained. What were the "understandings" of that 
period? In the preceding chapter may be seen some of them. 
It is in place here to record more. We have seen what they 
were, up to the time of the framing and adopting of the Fed- 
eral Constitution. What were they, then ? 

In the Convention that drafted the Constitution — 

Mr. Madison declared, be " thought it wrong to admit in the Constitution 
the idea that there could be property in men." — 3 Mad. Pap., 1429.* 

" On motion of Mr. Randolph, the word ' servitude' was struck out, and 
' service' unanimously inserted — the former being thought to express the 
condition of slaves, and the latter the obligation of free persons." — lb. 3, 
p. 1569. 

Such were the " understandings " of the Convention that 
drafted the Constitution. And with what "understanding" 
was it adopted by the people, in their State Conventions ? 
Let us see. 

James Wilson, of Pennsylvania, had been a leading member of the Con- 
vention, and in the Ratification Convention of his State, when speaking of 
the clause relating to the power of Congress over the slave trade after 
twenty years, he said : 

" I consider this clause as laying the foundation for banishing slavery out 
of this country ; and though the period is more distant than I could wish it, 
it will produce the same kind, gradual change as was produced in Pennsyl- 

* In other words, Mr. Madison would not consent that the Constitution should 
recognize even the legality of slavery ! This was a still more full, confident, and 
emphatic expression of the idea we have before quoted from Dr. Hopkins. 



SLAVEBY AND FREEDOM. 85 

vania. * * * The new States which are to he formed will he under the 
control of Congress in this particular, and slavery will never he introduced 
among them." — 2 Elliot's Debates, 452. 

In another place, speaking of this clause, he said : 

" It presents us witli the pleasing prospect that the rights of mankind 
will be acknowledged and established throughout the Union. If there was 
no other feature in the Constitution but this one, it would diffuse a beauty 
over its whole countenance. Yet the labor of a few years, and Congress 
will have power to exterminate slavery from within our borders." — lb. 2, 
p. 484. 

In the Ratification Convention of Massachusetts, Gen. Heath said : 

"The migration or importation, &c, is confined to the States now exist- 
ing only ; new States cannot claim it. Congress by their ordinance for 
creating new States some time since, declared that the new States shall be 
republican, and that there shall be no slavery in them." — lb. 2, p. 115. 

Nor were these views and anticipations confined to the free States. In 
the Ratification Convention of Virginia, Mr. Johnson said : 

" They tell us that they see a progressive danger of bringing about eman- 
cipation. The principle has begun since the Revolution. Let us do what we 
will, it will come round. Slavery has been the foundation of much of that 
impiety and dissipation which have been so much disseminated among our 
countrymen. If it were totally abolished, it would do much good." — lb. 3, 
pp. 6—48. 

Gov. Randolph rebuked those who expressed apprehensions that its influ- 
ence might be exerted on the side of freedom, by saying : 

" I hope that there are none here who, considering the subject in the calm 
light of philosophy, will advance an objection dishonorable toA'irginia, that, 
at the moment they are securing the rights of their citizens, there is a spark 
of hope that those unfortunate men now held in bondage may, by the 
operation of the General Government, be made free." — lb. 3, p. 598. 

Patrick Henry, in the same Convention, argued " the poicer 
of Congress, under the United States' Constitution, to abolish slavery 
in die States," and added : 

" Another thing will contribute to bring this event about. Slavery is 
detested. We feel its effects. We deplore it with all the pity of human- 
ity." — Debates Va. Convention, p. 463. 

" In the debates of the North Carolina Convention, Mr. Iredell, after- 
wards a Judge of the United States Supreme Court, said — ' When the entire 
abolition of slavery takes place, it will be an event which must be pleasing 
to every generous mind, and every friend of human nature.' " — " Power of 
Congress" &c.,pp. 31-2. 



86 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

Such, are a few specimens of the expressed " understand- 
ings" with which the people adopted the Constitution. 

Another class of historical facts, of the utmost importance 
to a right understanding of the slave question in America, 
relates to the expositions and arguments addressed to the 
people of the United States to persuade them to adopt the 
Federal Constitution. It is well known that the people were 
sensitively jealous of their rights at that period, and fearful 
of the encroachments of despotic power. A strong party, 
of which Mr. Jefferson (a prominent and zealous propagandist 
of abolitionism) was understood to be the nucleus, and after- 
wards became the successful presidential candidate, opposed 
the adoption of the Federal Constitution, as prepared by the 
Convention, on the ground of its alleged defects in not pro- 
viding sufficient securities for personal rights, and a more ample 
and explicit enunciation of the self-evident truths of the 
Declaration of 1776. This opposition drew out the distin- 
guished statesmen, Madison, Jay, and Hamilton, in a joint 
and elaborate defence of the Constitution as drafted, compri- 
sing a series of papers known as " The Federalist," and since 
collected into a large volume. These papers were extensively 
circulated before the action of the States, and were largely 
instrumental in securing their desired object. — No. 39 of " The 
Federalist," by James Madison, contains the following: 

'• The first question that offers itself is, whether the general form and 
aspect of the government be strictly republican. It is evident that no other 
form would be reconcilable with the genius of the people of America, and 
with the fundamental principles of the Revolution, or with that honorable 
determination which animates every votary of freedom, to rest all our polit- 
ical experiments on the capacity of mankind for self-government. If the 
plan of the Convention, therefore, be found to depart from the republican 
character, its advocates must abandon it, as no longer defensible." 

Mr. Madison proceeds, at some length, to discuss the ques- 
tion, "What are the distinctive characters of the republican 
form"? After distinctly repudiating the aristocracies and 
oligarchies of Holland, Venice, Poland, and England, as not 
being republican, though sometimes "dignified," very impro- 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 87 

perly, "with the appellation," Mr. Madison proceeds farther 
to define a republican government as one whose officers are 
appointed by the people, &c. " It is essential to such a gov- 
ernment," says he, "that it be derived from the great body of 
society, NOT from an inconsiderable portion, OR, a favored class 
of it." And this is the same Mr. Madison, who, in the Con- 
vention for drafting the Constitution which he was now re- 
commending, had insisted that the instrument must not recog- 
nize the legality of slavery. 

The adoption of the Federal Constitution was thus success- 
fully urged upon the people, by representing it as laying the 
foundation of the Government upon " the principles of the 
Revolution" — the principles of '76, — the principles promul- 
gated so effectively by Mr. Jefferson, who had said — 

"The true foundation of republican government is the equal rights of 
every citizen, in his person and property, and in their management," 
and who had explicitly designated the slaves as "citizens."* 

In Xo. S-i of " The Federalist " several pages are devoted 
to a consideration of what was evidently understood to be a 
vital point, in the minds of the people, who were so soon to 
decide on the adoption or rejection of the proposed Con- 
stitution. 

" The most considerable of the remaining objections," says 
the writer, "is, that the plan of the Convention contains no bill 
of rights." 

The writer speaks of "the intemperate partizans of a bill of 
rights," and of their " zeal in this matter." This shows that 
many of the people were sensitive on this point, and that the 
friends of the proposed Constitution were afraid of its being 
rejected in consequence. 

And how did " The Federalist " successfully allay this 
jealousy, and persuade the people to adopt the proposed Con- 
stitution ? 

* With what execration should the statesman be loaded, who, permitting one half 
of the citizens thus to trample upon the rights of the other, transforms those into 
despots, and these into enemies, destroys the morals of the one part, and the amor 
patfim of the other." — Notes on Virginia. 



88 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN" 

It was done, first, by citing a number of specific provisions 
in the Constitution, equivalent, (as was claimed) to so many 
corresponding items in a bill of rights ; and, second, by citing 
the Preamble to the Constitution, setting forth its objects 
" to secure the blessings of liberty," &c. to " the people of the 
United States." This Preamble, as being a part of the Con- 
stitution, and its very basis, to which all the rest was con- 
formed, was represented as being not only a bill of rights in 
the general, but " a better recognition of popular rights " than 
could otherwise have been framed, and less liable to be set 
aside, under a "plausible pretence," by men "disposed to 
usurp power."* 

The objectors had desired such a bill of rights as several of 
the States, particularly Massachusetts, had already adopted, 
and under which, before that time, the Courts of Massachusetts 
had decided slavery to be illegal. Yet " The Federalist " as- 
sured them that the Constitution was more than the equivalent 
of such bills of rights. 

It was under the pressure of expositions and arguments 
like these, from leading members of the Convention, that the 
people were persuaded to ratify the Constitution that had been 
elaborated with closed doors. They ratified it with "the 
understanding," so frequently expressed by and among them, 
that the Constitution was in favor of freedom. We know of 
no record in which the ratification of that instrument was 
urged, either at the North or at the South, on the ground that 
it was the guaranty of any form of despotism — or on the 
ground that the conflicting interests of liberty and slavery 
had been compromised. The whole current of the political 
literature of that period forbids the idea that any such appeals 
could have been adventured. 

But the people, though they ratified the Constitution, were 



* The reader is doubtless familiar with the modern pleas, that the Preamble has 
no controlling; power over the Constitution; that it does not furnish a criterion for 
Constitutional exposition ; and that, in fact, it is no part of the Constitution ! We 
may jiuk r e what would have been the fate of the proposed Constitution, if its friends 
had outstript its enemies in representing it thus ! 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 89 

not satisfied to do so without insisting upon important amend- 
ments. The Conventions of Virginia, North Carolina and 
Rhode Island, proposed a provision as follows : 

" No kkeeman ought to he taken, imprisoned, or disseized of his free- 
hold, liberties, privileges, or franchises, or outlawed, or exiled, or in any 
manner despoiled or deprived of his life, liberty, or property, but by the 
law of the LAND." — EllioCs Debates, 658. 

New York proposed a different provision : 

" No person ought to be taken, imprisoned, or disseized of his freehold, 
or be exiled, or deprived of his privileges, franchises, life, liberty, or pro- 
perty, but by due process of law." — 1 Ibid, 328. 

These various propositions came before Congress, and that body, at its 
first session, agreed upon several amendments to the Constitution, which 
were subsequently ratified by the States. That which related to personal 
liberty was expressed in these comprehensive words : 

" No person * * * * shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property, 
without due process of law." — Cons., Amend., Art. 5. 

It is to be noted, as an important historical fact, that this 
remarkable provision is an amendment, coming in after the 
original instrument had been ratified, thus over-riding and 
controlling, like all other amendments, whatever in the origi- 
nal instrument may have been supposed to be of a contrary 
bearing. 

The ratification of Rhode Island was longest withheld, and 
was most remarkable in its mode of expression. It was, in 
fact, conditional. It specified a long list of declarations of 
rights, and then said : 

" Under these impressions, and declaring that the rights aforesaid cannot 
be abridged, and that the explanations aforesaid are consistent with the said 
Constitution, and in confidence that the amendments hereafter mentioned 
will receive an early and mature deliberation, and conformably to the 5th 
article of said Constitution, speedily become parts thereof: We the said 
delegates," &c, &c, " do assent to and ratify the said Constitution." 

Among these declarations of rights were some equivalent 
to those of the Declaration of Independence.- 

Among the proposed amendments, above mentioned, was 
the following : 

" As a traffic tending to establish or continue the slavery of any part of 
the human species, is disgraceful to the cause of religion and -humanity, that 



90 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

Congress as soon as may be, promote and establish such laws as may 
effectually prevent the importation of slaves, of any description, into tbe 
United States." 

From this it is seen, that the State whose citizens were most 
deeply engaged in the lucrative importation of slaves, the only 
State, perhaps, that was growing rich by the continuance of the 
slave system, consented to ratify the Federal Constitution only 
on condition that the traffic should be speedily prohibited. No 
other ratification of the Constitution was ever made by Rhode 
Island. She never consented to the twenty years' delay of that 
prohibition. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 91 



CHAPTER X. 

OF DIRECT ANTI-SLAVERY EFFORTS, INCLUDING ECCLESIASTI- 
CAL ACTION, FROM THE PERIOD OF THE REVOLUTION TO 
THE CLOSE OF TnE LAST CENTURY, AND THE ABOLITION 
OF SLAVERY IN THE NORTHERN STATES. 

Republication of Hopkins' Dialogue (17S5) — Edwards' Sermon (1791) — Anti-Slavery 
Meeting at Woodbridgc, N. J. (1783) — Abolition Societies in Pennsylvania, New 
York, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Maryland, Virginia, New Jersey, Delaware — 
Names of distinguished abolitionists — Memorial to Leg. of New York, by Jay, 
Hamilton, &c. — Petitions to Congress, by B. Franklin and others — Discussions in 
Congress — William and Mary College (Va.) — Action of Methodist E. Conference — 
Presb. General Assembly — Baptists — Action of the States — Virginia, Delaware, 
Rhode Island, Vermont — Massachusetts — Pennsylvania — New Hampshire, Con- 
necticut — New York — New Jersey — Census of remaining slaves. 

Significant as are the facts recorded in the two preceding 
chapters, they would fail of producing their full and proper 
impression, unless connected with an account of other move- 
ments witnessed at the same time, and extending to a still 
later period of our history. It was not in the National Coun- 
cils alone, the resolutions and acts of Congress, the corres- 
ponding proceedings of State and County Conventions, the 
action of State legislatures, and the declarations of prominent 
statesmen, that the rising of sentiment against slavery was 
apparent. Then, as at other times, under popular institu- 
tions, such manifestations were to be regarded as evidences of 
a still broader and deeper current of public opinion, that was 
producing them. Then, as now ; here, as in Great Britain, 
the public bodies and functionaries nearest to the people, 
freshest from their bosom, most accessible to their inspection, 



92 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

and most directly and vitally amenable to them (" Kepresen- 
tatives" and "Commons," in distinction from "Lords" and 
"Senates"), were most deeply imbued with the principles of 
justice and freedom — a general fact of incalculable weight in 
the argument for thoroughly democratic institutions. 

And back of this general public sentiment against slavery, 
were the moral influences that had been operating in that 
direction — the religious testimonies and the ecclesiastical action 
before mentioned. The power of the press, and of voluntary 
association, irrespective of sect, followed soon afterward. 

The first edition of Hopkins' Dialogue was published at 
Norwich, Connecticut, early in 1776, as before stated. Its 
circulation was extensive, and is known to have produced a 
powerful impression upon the minds of reflecting men, includ- 
ing some in high stations. A second edition was issued in 
New York in 1785, " by vote of the society for promoting 
the manumission of slaves" — of which John Jay was Presi- 
dent, and which had been formed January 25th of that same 
year. 

Another publication, of great weight and influence, was the 
celebrated sermon of Dr. Jonathan Edwards, of New Haven, 
Conn., afterwards President of Union College, Schenectady, 
preached before the Connecticut Society for the Promotion of 
Freedom, &c., Sept. 15, 1791. It is a masterpiece of logical 
argument, and was extensively circulated by the manumission 
and abolition societies of that period, as it has been since by 
the more modern anti-slavery societies. 

By these two publications, the argument against slavery 
was placed upon a deeper and broader theological and meta- 
physical basis, and was pushed to more startling and radical 
conclusions, than in any previous writings on the subject with 
which we are acquainted. And it may safely be said that no 
later writers have gone beyond them in affirming the inherent 
sinfulness and deep criminality of slaveholding, and the duty 
of immediate and unconditional emancipation. Particularly 
is this true of the sermon of Edwards. If others have insisted 
upon these points with more vehemence of declamation, or 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 93 

with a more brilliant display of rhetoric, there is no one who 
has more deliberately and triumphantly demonstrated those 
truths by a process of cool iron-linked argument, placing it 
forever beyond the power of man to unsettle them, without 
dethroning the moral sense, rejecting the inductions of reason, 
and abjuring the Christian religion. It is not known that any 
writer or public speaker of any note, has ever attempted to 
grapple with that sermon, attempting to criticize, or to con- 
fute it. And yet this forbearance cannot be because the lan- 
guage employed is more smooth and mild than that of other 
writings that have been criticized as denunciatory. The 
preacher distinctly charges upon the slaveholder the crime of 
man-stealing, and the repetition of the crime every day he 
continues to hold a slave in bondage. He charges him also 
with " theft or robbery" — nay, with " a greater crime than for- 
nication, theft, or robbery." He predicts that, "if we may 
judge the future by the past, within fifty years from this time 
it will be as shameful for a man to hold a negro slave, as to 
be guilty of common robbery or theft." In an appendix, Dr. 
Edwards answers objections against immediate emancipation, 
just as modern abolitionists answer them now. 

Such were the sentiments which the abolition societies of 
the last century, directed by the patriots of the American 
Revolution, the founders of the Union, the framers and 
the adopters of the Federal Constitution, were intent to circu- 
late through the country. If some of them, as statesmen, did 
not fully carry out the idea of immediate emancipation taught 
in such writings, they circulated them among the people, 
nevertheless. These were the effective weapons of their war- 
fare against slavery, so far as they succeeded at all. By these 
doctrines, mainly, the public conscience was reached, and the 
measures put in progress, which finally resulted in the aboli- 
tion of slavery in some of the States. The doctrines are none 
the less true and trustworthy because the partial adoption of 
them produced but partial and tardy results. If the abolition 
of slavery in some of the States was so slow and gradual as 
to occupy a whole generation or more in the process, if in 



94 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

some others it still lingers, or has been indefinitely postponed, 
while the system has strengthened itself, and the slave power 
has assumed the control of the nation and stealthily reversed 
its policy, the fault does not lie in the teachings of Hopkins 
and Edwards, but in the mistaken prudence of those who 
thought it more wise and safe to follow but partially in prac- 
tice what was admitted to be right and true in the abstract. 
To this single fallacy, the failure of the Revolutionary aboli- 
tionists, in their intended overthrow of American slavery, 
may be distinctly traced. " The ruse of gradualism," iden- 
tical with deferred repentance for sin, produced its accustomed 
and legitimate fruits. It deceived them, as it deceives the 
greater portion of mankind. 

We may honor their earnest endeavors, nevertheless, and 
rejoice in the success, however limited, with which their labors 
were crowned, it should be ours to emulate their love of 
freedom, and avoid their mistakes, the repetition of which 
would be less excusable in us. 

An important and highly spirited anti-slavery meeting is 
said to have been held at Woodbridge, New Jersey, appro- 
priately convened on the 4th of July, 1783, just seven years 
after the Declaration of inalienable rights that was now ad- 
mitted to have been man fully and successfully sustained. 
Dr. Bloomfield, father of Governor Bloomfield of New Jersey, 
is said to have presided on that joyous occasion, which was 
celebrated by a public dinner, for which was provided a 
roasted ox — a circumstance that attests the general and cor- 
dial attendance of the citizens. Who could have predicted 
the era of pro-slavery mobs against abolition meetings then? 
Who would have looked for biblical defences of slaveholding, 
from the high places of Princeton ? Who would have be- 
lieved that churches and pulpits, generally, throughout the 
country, would ever be closed against the discussion of slavery, 
for fear of " disturbing the peace of our Zion ?" Who would 
have believed that anti-slavery agitation would ever have been 
regarded with abhorrence, as adverse to " the perpetuity of 
our glorious Union ?'"' What value could the patriots of that 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. . 95 

day have attached to any "union that was not cemented on the 
basis of freedom, and designed for its guaranty? 

ABOLITION SOCIETIES. 

It may be difficult to enumerate all the manumission and 
abolition societies of this period, or to fix, accurately, the pre- 
cise dates of their organization. The particulars that follow 
embody what we have at command. 

Dr. Holmes, in his "American Annals," says that the Abo- 
lition Society of Pennsylvania was formed in 1774, and was 
enlarged in 1787. Ilildreth, in his " History of the United 
States," says the Pennsylvania Society was the first. Edward 
Needles, in his "Historical Memoir of the Pennsylvania Soci- 
ety for the abolition of Slavery, the relief of free negroes un- 
lawfully held in bondage, and for improving the African race," 
says the first associated action in Philadelphia was a meeting 
of a few individuals at the Sun tavern in Second-street, April 
14, 1775,* when a society was formed " for the relief of free 
negroes unlawfully held in bondage." The society met four 
times in 1775, and adjourned to meet in 1776 ; but, on account 
of the war, no meeting occurred till February, 1784, after 
which its meetings were continued till March, 1787, when the 
Constitution was so revised as to include prominently " the 
abolition of slavery" as in the above title. Of this Society, Dr. 
Benjamin Franklin was chosen President. 

The New York " Society for promoting the Manumission 
of Slaves, and protecting such of them as have been or may 
be liberated," was formed January 25, 1785, as before men- 
tioned. Of this society, John Jay was the first President. 
On being appointed Chief-Justice of the United States, he re- 
signed, and was succeeded by Gen. Alexander Hamilton, who 
held the office a few months, until, on receiving an appoint- 
ment in the Federal cabinet, he removed to Philadelphia, and 
soon after his place was filled by " Gen. Matthew Clarkson, 
the United States Marshal for New York, a very pious, good 



* One year later than the statement of Dr. Holmes. 



96 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

man, and belonging to a different species from the general 
race of slave-catching marshals."* 

May 5, 1786, the committee of the New York Society re- 
ported that a similar society was about to be established at 
Providence, Rhode Island. In 1788 the Pennsylvania Society 
addressed their corresponding members in Rhode Island, 
about vessels fitting out there in defiance of the laws against 
the slave trade. In 1791 the Rhode Island Society is alluded 
to as having memorialized Congress, in conjunction with the 
abolition societies of Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania, 
Baltimore, Virginia, and two societies on the eastern shore of 
Maryland. 

The Maryland Abolition Society was formed in 1789. The 
Connecticut Abolition Society in 1790 ; the Virginia Abolition 
Society in 1791. The New Jersey Society " for promoting 
the Abolition of Slavery," in 1792. 

The Maryland and Virginia Societies had auxiliaries in dif- 
ferent parts of those States. 

There was also a society in Delaware. In 1791, ten socie- 
ties met in convention in Philadelphia, and continued to meet 
annually, for a number of years afterwards. 

Of the Pennsylvania Abolition Society, Benjamin Franklin 
was chosen President, and Benjamin Rush Secretary, both sign- 
ers of the Declaration of Independence, and the first-named 
just returned from the convention that drafted the Federal 
Constitution. Among the officers of the Maryland Society 
was Samuel Chase, one of the signers of the Declaration of 
Independence, afterwards Judge of the United States' Supreme 
Court, and Luther Martin, a member of the Constitutional 
Convention. Of the Connecticut Abolition Society, Dr. Ezra 
Stiles, President of Yale College, was the first President, and 
Simeon Baldwin was Secretary. 

"Among other distinguished individuals who were efficient officers of 
these abolition societies, and delegates from their respective State societies, 
at the annual meetings of the American Convention for Promoting the 



* MSS. by Hon. Win. Jay. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 97 

Abolition of Slavery, were Hon. Uriah Tracy, United States Senator from 
Connecticut; Hon. Zephaniah Swift, Chief Justice of the same; Hon. 
Caesar A. Rodney, Attorney-General of the United States ; Hon. James A. 
Bayard, United States Senator from Delaware ; Gov. Bloomfield, of New 
Jersey ; Hon. Wm. Rawle, the late venerable bead of the Philadelphia 
bar ; Dr. Casper Wistar, of Philadelphia; Messrs. Foster and Tillinghast, 
of Rhode Island ; Messrs. Ridgley, Buchanan, and Wilkinson, of Maryland ; 
and Messrs. Pleasants, .McLean, and Anthony, of Virginia." — Power of 
Congress, &c, pp. 30, 31. 

These Abolition Societies and the officers and members of 
them were not idle. They agitated the subject, circulated 
publications, and petitioned legislative bodies. 

In 1786, John Jay drafted and signed a memorial to the 
Legislature of New York against slavery, and petitioning for 
its abolition, declaring that the men held as slaves by the 
laws of New York, were free by the law of God. Among the 
other petitioners were James Duane, Mayor of the City of 
New York, Eobert R. Livingston, afterwards Secretary of 
Foreign Affairs of the United States and Chancellor of the 
State of New York, Alexander Hamilton, and many other 
eminent citizens of the State.* 

Nor were petitions addressed only to the legislatures of the 
States in which the petitioners resided. The doctrines of 
moral and political non-intervention with the delicate subject 
had not then been discovered. The dogma that Congress has 
nothing to do with slavery in the States does not appear to 
have obtained general currency at that period. These state- 
ments are believed to express simple historical facts, and appli- 
cable up to a point of time after the Federal Constitution had 
been drafted, discussed, and adopted, and the Federal Govern- 
ment under that Constitution organized and put in operation. 
A few particulars will suffice to justify these statements. 

Both the Virginia and Maryland Abolition Societies,, at an 
early day, sent up memorials to Congress. We have not at 
hand the precise dates, nor is this important. The dates of 
the organization of these societies, particularly that of Vir- 

* LISS. by Hon. Wm. Jav. 

7 



98 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

ginia, make it evident that their petitions were addressed to 
the new Federal Government. The Connecticut Abolition 
Society sent up a petition in 1791. The Society of Friends 
and the Pennsylvania Abolition Society had done so, still 
earlier, and their petitions came before the first Congress 
under the new Constitution, and were debated February 12th, 
1790.* 

These petitions were addressed to Congress. What could 
the petitioners have supposed that Congress had to do with 
the subject? The Foreign Slave Trade, at that time, appears 
to have been interdicted by most of the States, in conformity 
with the original compact of 1774, and was not resumed, even 
by South Carolina, as has already been stated, until 1803. 
And among the " compromises of the Constitution," since 
claimed, a prominent one, and the best authenticated, is that 
which prevented Congress from interdicting the foreign traffic, 
until 1808. The cession of the District of Columbia was not 
accepted by Congress until July 16, 1790, some time after the 
presentation of the Pennsylvania petition. The seat of the 
Federal Government, then, and for some years afterwards, 
was at Philadelphia. By the ordinance of 1787, slavery had 
been prohibited in the North Western Territory, and no one 
anticipated the admission of any new slave states. What, 
then, was there for Congress to do, according to the doctrine 
of non-intervention now entertained ? What was it that the 
petitioners asked? Against what did they petition? And 
where did it exist ? 

A copy of the Pennsylvania petition is before us, and por- 
tions of those from Connecticut and Virginia. 

The Connecticut petitioners, (Pres. Stiles, Simeon Baldwin, 
&c.) say : 

" From a sober eofsviction of the unrighteousness of slavery, your 

* Mr. Weld's paaapMet-and the Liberty Bell give the date 1789, but Washington 
was not inaugurated until April 80th of that year, and the " first Congress" com- 
menced its first session, April 7th. Besides, the petition of the Pennsylvania So- 
ciety, signed by Benjamin Franklin, as published in the Liberty Bell, bears date 
Feb. 3, 1790, and the Journal of Congress mentions its presentation, Feb. 12, 1790. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 99 

petitioners have long beheld with grief our fellow-men doomed to perpe- 
tual bondage in a country which boasts her freedom. Your petitioners 
are fully of opinion that calm reflection will at last convince the world that 
THE Whole system ok American slavery is unjust in its nature, im- 
politic in its principles, and in its consequences ruinous to the industry and 
enterprise of the citizens of THESE STATES." 

The " Virginia Society for the Abolition of Slavery," &c, 
in addressing the Congress of the United States, say : 

" Your memorialists, fully aware that righteousness exalteth a nation, and 
that SLAVERY is not only an odious degradation, but an outrageous viola- 
tion of one of the most essential rights of human nature, and utterly repug- 
nant to the precepts of the Gospel, which breathes 'peace on earth and 
good will to men,' lament that a practice so inconsistent with true policy 
and the inalienable rights of men, should subsist in so enlightened an age, 
and among a people professing that all mankind are, by nature, equally en- 
titled to freedom." 

" The memorial of the Pennsylvania Society for promoting 
the abolition of Slavery," &c, addressed "to the Senate and 
House of Kepresentatives of the United States, 11 contains the 
following : 

" Your memorialists, particularly engaged in attending to the distresses 
arising from SLAVERY, believe it to be their indispensable duty to present 
this subject to your notice. They have observed, with real satisfaction, 
that many important and salutary powers are vested in you, for ' pro- 
moting the welfare and securing the blessings of liberty to the PEOPLE 
of the UNITED STATES ;'* and as they conceive that these blessings 
ought rightfully to be administered, without distinction of color, to all 
descriptions of people, so they indulge themselves in the pleasing expecta- 
tion that nothing which can be done for the relief of the unhappy objects 
of their care, will be either omitted or delayed. 

" From a persuasion that equal liberty was originally the portion, and is 
still the birth-right of all men, and influenced by the strong ties of humanity 
and the principles of their institution, your memorialists conceive themselves 
bound to use all justifiable endeavors to loosen the bonds of slavery, and 
promote a general enjoyment of the blessings of freedom. Under these 
impressions, they earnestly entreat your attention to the subject of slavcri/ ; 
that you will be pleased to countenance the restoration to liberty of 

* This language is evidently taken from the Preamble to the Federal Constitu- 
tion. " We, the people of the United StateB, in order to promote the general wel- 
fare, and secure the blessings of liberty," etc., &c. 

LofC. 



100 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

those unhappy men, who, alone, in this land of freedom, are degraded into 
perpetual bondage, and who, amid the general joy of surrounding freemen, 
are groaning in servile subjection ; that you will devise means for re- 
moving THIS INCONSISTENCY OF CHARACTER FROM THE AMERICAN 

PEOPLE ; that you will promote mercy and justice towards this distressed 
race ; and that you will step to the very verge of the power vested in you 
for discouraging every species of traffic in the persons of our fellow-men. 
BENJAMIN FRANKLIN, President."'' 
Philadelphia, Feb. 3, 1790. [Federal Gazette, 1790.] 

DISCUSSIONS IN CONGRESS. 

How were these petitions understood in Congress ? How 
were they received and treated ? Were they understood to 
look in the direction of a general removal of slavery, as well 
as the slave trade ? Were the petitioners denounced as fa- 
natics and madmen ? Was the application repelled as treason 
against the Constitution and the Union? On the other hand, 
were there any who expressed a readiness " to espouse their 
cause " ? The reader of the following extracts from the dis- 
cussions, will judge. 

In the debate on the petition from Pennsylvania, Mr. Par- 
ker, of Virginia, said : 

" I hope, Mr. Speaker, the petition of these respectable people will be 
attended to, with all the readiness the importance of its object demands ; 
and 1 cannot help expressing the pleasure I feel in finding so considerable a 
part of the community attending to matters of such a momentous concern 
to the future prosperity and happiness of the people of America. I think 
it my duty, as a citizen of the Union, to espouse their cause." 

Mr. Page, of Virginia (afterward Governor) " was in favor of the com- 
mitment. He hoped that the designs of the respectable memorialists would 
not be stopped at the threshold, in order to preclude a fair discussion of the 
prayer of the memorial. With respect to the alarm that was apprehended, 
he conjectured there was none; but there might be just cause, if the me- 
morial was not taken into consideration. He placed himself in the case 
of the slave, and said that, on hearing that Congress had refused to listen to 
the decent suggestions of a respectable part of the community, he should 
infer that the general Government, from which was expected great 

* This was probably the last important public act of Franklin, who died the 
same year. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 101 

good would result to every class of citizens,* had shut their ears 
against the voice of humanity, and he should despair of any alleviation of 
the miseries he and his posterity had in prospeet. If anything could induce 
him to rebel, it must be a stroke like this, impressing on his mind all the 
horrors of despair. But if he was told that application was made in his 
behalf, and that Congress were willing to hear what could be urged in favor 
of discouraging the practice of importing his fellow-wretches, he would 
trust in their justice and humanity, and wait the decision patiently." 

Mr. Scott, of Pennsylvania; " I cannot, for my part, conceive how any 
person can be said to acquire property in another ;f but — enough of 
those who reduce men to the state of transferable goods, or use them like 
beasts of burden, who deliver them up as the patrimony or property of 
another man. J Let us argue on principles countenanced by reason and 
becoming humanity. I do not know how far I might go if 1 was one of 
the Judges of the United States, and those people were to come before me, 
and claim their emancipation ; but I am sure I would go as far as I could. "fy 

Mr. Burke, of South Carolina, said : " He saw the disposition of the 
House, and he feared it would be referred to a committee, maugre all their 
opposition." 

Mr. Smith, of South Carolina, said : " that on entering into this govern- 
ment, they (South Carolina and Georgia) apprehended that the other States, 
not knowing the necessity of the citizens of the Southern States, would, 
from motives of humanity and benevolence, be led to vote for a general 
emancipation ; and, had they not seen that the Constitution provided 
against the effect of such a disposition, I may be bold to say they never 
would have adopted it." 

" In the debate, at the same session, May 13th, on the petition of the 
.Society of Friends respecting the slave trade, Mr. Parker, of Virginia, 
said : ' He hoped Congress would do all that lay in their power to restore 
ti> human nature its inherent privileges, and, if possible, wipe out the 
stigma that America labored under. The inconsistency in our principles, 
with which we are justly charged, should be done away, that we may show, 
by our actions, the pure beneficence of the doctrine we held out to the 
world in our Declaration of Independence.' " 

" Mr. Jackson, of Georgia, said : ' It was the fashion of the day 
to favor the liberty of the slaves. * * * What is to be done 
for compensation ? Will Virginia set all her negroes free ? Will they give 

* Here, again, we find the negro slaves expressly designated as citizens. 

t Another blow at the idea of the legality of slavery. 

% How does this harmonize with the Constitutional obligation of delivering up 
fugitive slaves? 

§ A pregnant hint of the speaker's impression of the duties of the Federal 
Courts. 



102 GEE AT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

up the money they have cost them, and to whom ? When this practice 
comes to be tried, then the sound of liberty will lose those charms which 
make it grateful to the ravished ear.' " 

" Mr. Madison, of Virginia : ' The dictates of humanity, the principles 
of the people, the national safety and happiness, and prudent policy, require 
it of us. The Constitution has particularly called our attention to it. * * 
I conceive the Constitution in this particular was formed in order that the 
Government, whilst it was restrained from laying a total prohibition, might 
be able to give some testimony of the sense of America, with respect to 
the African trade. * * * It is to be hoped, that by expressing a 
national disapprobation of the trade, we may destroy it, and save our 
country from reproaches, and our posterity from the imbecility ever atten- 
dant on a country filled with slaves. I do not wish to say anything harsh 
to the hearing of gentlemen who entertain different sentiments from me, or 
different sentiments from those I represent. But if there is any one point 
in which it is clearly the policy of this nation, so far as we constitu- 
tionally can, to vary the practice obtaining under some of the State Go- 
vernments, it is this. But it is certain that a majority of the States are 
opposed to the practice." — Cong. Reg., v. i., pp. 308-12 ; Weld's Power of 
Cong., &c, pp. 30-32. 

There may be some difficulty in apprehending, clearly, the 
import of some of the expressions used in this debate. This 
may be owing to our making a broad distinction, now, which 
seems scarcely to have been recognized at all, then, between 
the slave trade and slavery. It seems to have been taken for 
granted that the prohibition of the former would involve, 
virtually, the extinction of the latter. Georgia had desired a 
respite of twenty years, which, by the Constitution, had been 
granted. Thus far the hands of Congress were tied. Thus, 
at least, it was understood by the speakers. This was the com- 
promise claimed. This exposition of the position of the speak- 
ers, if it be correct, enables us to understand the drift of their 
arguments. What then do we find ? 

First, we have the presentation of petitions, some of them 
said to be in respect to the slave trade, others of them (inclu- 
ding that of Dr. Franklin) as evidently bearing upon "sla- 
very" itself, desiring for the slaves their " restoration to 
liberty," and that Congress would " devise means" in some 
way, for "removing this inconsistency from the American 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 103 

character." The two descriptions of petitions appear to have 
had the same object, and to have been received and considered 
accordingly. 

Next, we have two gentlemen from Virginia decidedly 
"espousing the cause" of the petitioners, followed up by a 
representative of Pennsylvania, on the same side. 

Then, we have a specimen of the opposition, from South 
Carolina and Georgia ; and finally, an effort, by Mr. Madison, 
to reconcile the difference between the parties, though strong- 
ly leaning to the side of the petitioners, and declaring that he 
represented, for his constituents, those sentiments. 

The main object of the slave party, seems to have been to 
stave off present action. The House, and the Country, they 
saw and acknowledged, were disposed to be against them — 
disppsed to liberate "the slaves." They pleaded the consti- 
tutional compromise, that is, the postponement till 1808. 
Yet they raised the question of compensation, as much as to 
intimate that if the country was ready to meet their demands 
in this respect, they might waive their constitutional objec- 
tions. And this was then the extent of South. Carolinian 
and Georgian opposition ! " Humanity and benevolence" they 
admitted, was on the side of the petitioners, and of those 
who might " vote for a general emancipation." Not a word 
of the dangers of turning the slaves loose. Not a single 
threat of dissolving the Union. Not a lisp of the sacred guar- 
anties of the Constitution, of the obligation to protect and 
extend slavery ! 

From the advocates of liberty, in the Ilouse, then, we hear 
no concessions of the compromises of the Constitution. Those, 
they left in the hands of their opponents, and in the hands 
of the illustrious pacificator between the two parties. And 
even his (Mr. Madison's) speech, would be accounted a radical 
abolition harangue, were it uttered in Congress now. It is 
instructive to ponder these contrasts. We need to be disa- 
bused of our vague impressions and educational prejudices, if 
we would understand the relation of slavery to our political 
institutions, as at first established. 



104 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

Little incidents, often, more than imposing official docu- 
ments, and public records, reveal public character, and assist 
us to understand the spirit and temper of a particular age 
or people. " In 1791, the university of William and Mary, 
in Virginia, conferred upon Granville Sharp, of England, the 
Degree of Doctor of Laws."* Who was Granville Sharp ? 
And by what discoveries in the sublime science of jurispru- 
dence had Granville Sharp, a clerk in the ordinance depart- 
ment of Great Britain, commended himself to a Virginian Uni- 
versity, for so distinguishing an honor ? The reader of the 
preceding chapters understands. Granville Sharp had dis- 
covered and announced the utter and absolute illegality of sla- 
very under the aegis of the British Constitution, and under 
the jurisdiction of English Common Law. With this dis- 
covery he had enlightened the British mind, had reversed the 
legal decisions and opinions of York and Talbot — of Black- 
stone and Mansfield. Without a seat in the Court of King's 
Bench, nay, without the credentials that could entitle him, by 
the usages of Court, to stand up in its presence and plead a 
cause, Granville Sharp, by the simple force of his lofty intel- 
lect and indomitable and righteous purpose, had laid his hand 
on that Court of King's Bench, and compelled it to do (unwil- 
lingly enough) his bidding, in the decree that " slaves cannot 
breathe in England." More than this — Granville Sharp, per- 
ceiving that this decree was binding on the colonies of Bri- 
tain, as well as on the mother country, had solemnly admon- 
ished the British prime minister of his high responsibilities 
in this respect, and with all the majesty of a holy prophet had 
charged him, on the peril of his soul, to lose no time. in sup- 
pressing slavery in America. This was the high merit of Gran- 
ville Sharp. For this, he wore, meekly, the clustering homage 
of the wise and good, of two hemispheres. The University 
of William and Mar}*, in Virginia, eagerly honored herself 
by honoring Granville Sharp. What a change has since 
taken place ! Had Granville Sharp lived to visit the Univer- 

* Power of Congress, &c, p. 36. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 105 

sitj of William and Mary, in 1835, his temerity would pro- 
bably have cost him his life. He would have subjected 
himself to the liability of being ignominiously and uncere- 
moniously hanged up, without judge or jury, or condemned 
to death under the laws of the State.* Were the public sen- 
timent of Virginia, and of the whole country, now, what they 
were in 1791, those English philanthropists who are now de- 
nounced as impertinent intermeddlers, would be fair candi- 
dates for the highest honors of the University of William and 
Mary, in Virginia. 

Can it be credible that a change of sentiment like this can 
have come over Virginia, and over the nation, without bring- 
ing along with it new maxims of state policy, new principles 
of jurisprudence, new views of the relation of slavery to our 
Constitution and laws? — and with these — of necessity — new 
usages of Constitutional exposition, — new conceptions of the 
relations described by it, and of the obligations and rights 
growing out of those relations ? May it be assumed, without 
scrutiny, that the usages and expositions with which we, in 
tliis age, have become familiarized, are trustworthy ? 

* No exaggeration in this. The very writings of Granville Sharp could not have 
been safely circulated in Virginia in 1885, if indeed they can be at present. On 
charge of having circulated anti-slavery writings, Dr. Reuben Crandall was arrested 
and tried for his life, in the District of Columbia, and on prosecution of the late 
Francis S. Key, Esq., one of the most popular citizens of the District. The " incen- 
diary publications," for the publishing of which the late R. G. Williams, of New 
York, was indicted, and demanded to be given up to the authorities of Alabama, 
by the Executive of that State, included the writings of Granville Sharp, and 
nothing beside them that could have been more offensive than they must have 
been. Nothing more strongly condemnatory of slavery and of slaveholders could 
have been found in the papers pillaged from the U.S. mail at Charleston, and burnt. 
By the laws of Virginia, the publishing or circulating of publications having a ten- 
dency to excite slaves or free people of color to insurrection or resistance, is punished 
with thirty-nine lashes ; the second with death." Amos Dresser, though without the 
forms of a legal trial, suffered a public whipping in Tennessee. Whatever may have 
appeared on the antiquated statute books of Virginia, in 1791, the simple incident 
we have recorded affords evidence of the change of public sentiment we have de- 
scribed — a change the more marked, in proportion as the sentiment of 1791 was in 
opposition to her own statutes. 



106 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 



ECCLESIASTICAL BODIES — METHODISTS. 

The position and language of ecclesiastical bodies at that 
era, furnish another significant feature of our history. 

In the year 1780, the sentiments of the Methodist societies in this 
country were thus expressed in the minutes of the Conference for that year: 

" The Conference acknowledges that slavery is contrary to the laws of 
God, man,* and nature, hurtful to society ; contrary to the dictates of con- 
science and pure religion, and doing what we would not that others should 
do unto us, and they pass their disapprohation upon all our friends who keep 
slaves, and they advise their freedom." — J.. S. Manual, by Sunderland, 
p. 58. 

In 1785, the following language was held by the M. E. 

Church : 

" We do hold in the deepest abhorrence the practice of slavery, and shall 
not cease to seek its destruction, by all wise and prudent means." 

The following is extracted from Sunderland's Anti-Slavery 
Manual, published in 1837 : 

From Lee's History of the Methodists, p. 101, we learn that the M. E. 
Church was organized with a number of express rules on the subject which 
stipulated that slavery should not be continued in the church. One 
of them was as follows : 

" Every member in our Society shall legally execute and record an instru- 
ment [for the purpose of setting every slave in his possession free] within 
the space of two years." 

Another was as follows : 

" Every person concerned who will not comply with these rules, shall 
have liberty quietly to withdraw from our Society within twelve months 
following the notice being given him as aforesaid : — otherwise, the assistant 
shall exclude him from the Society." 

Another rule declared that 

" Those who bought or sold slaves, or gave them away, unless on purpose 
to free them, should be expelled immediately." 

* " Contrary to the laws of man.' 1 '' Here we find another admission of the ille- 
gality of slavery, corresponding witli the doctrines of Granville Sharp, the decision 
of Lord Mansfield in the Somerset case, the expressions of Dr. Hopkins, the decla- 
ration of James Madison, and the speech in Congress of Mr. Scott, of Pennsylvania. 
Were all these ignorant enthusiasts ? Or Las slavery become legalized since ? 

/ 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 107 

" And forty years ago" (». c. in 1797), the discipline of this church con- 
tained the following directions on the subject : 

" The preachers and other members of our Society are requested to con- 
sider the subject of negro slavery, with deep attention, and that they impart 
to the General Conference, through the medium of the Yearly Conferences, 
or otherwise, any important thoughts on the subject, that the Conference 
may have full light, in order to take further steps towards eradicating 
this enormous evil from that part of the Church of God with which they 
are connected. The Annual Conferences are directed to draw up addresses 
for the gradual emancipation of the slaves, to the legislatures of those States 
in which no general laws have been passed for that purpose. These 
addresses shall urge, in the most respectful but pointed manner, the neces- 
sity of a law for the gradual emancipation of slaves. Proper committees 
shall be appointed by the Annual Conferences, out of the most respectable 
of our friends, for conducting the business ; and presiding elders, elders, 
deacons, and travelling preachers, shall procure as many proper signatures 
as possible to the addresses, and give all the assistance in their power, in 
EVERY respect, to aid the committees, and to forward the blessed under- 
taking. Let this be continued from year to year, till the desired end be 
accomplished." — .4. <S. Manual, pp. 58-9. 

These directions were not a dead letter. Persons still living 
can remember the circulating of anti-slavery petitions, and 
the distributing of Wesley's Tract on Slavery, by the Metho- 
dist travelling preachers, as a part of their official business. 
So late as the year 1803, the Hymn Books of the M. E. 
Church, published by Ezekiel Cooper for the M. E. Book 
Concern, at Philadelphia, contained advertisements of the 
"Tract on Slavery." Here then was the entire Methodist 
Episcopal connection organized into a society for anti-slavery 
agitation, its Annual Conferences inviting free discussion and 
seeking for more light, its preachers and church officers circu- 
lating anti-slavery publications and petitions to legislative 
bodies. The contrast with later times we cannot stop here 
to present. 

PRESBYTERIANS. 

The General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church adopted, 
in 179i, a note to the one hundred and forty -second question 
in the larger Catechism, in the Confession of Faith, in the 
words following: 



108 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

" 1 Tim. 1 : 10. ' The law is made for man-stealers.' This crime, 
among the Jews, exposed the perpetrators of it to capital punishment, 
Exodus 21 : 16, and the apostle here classes them with sinners of the first 
rank. The word he uses, in its original import, comprehends all who are 
concerned in bringing any of the human race into slavery, or retaining them 
in it. Hominum fures, qui servos, vel libros abducunt, retinent vendunt, vel 
tmunt. Stealers of men are those who bring oft" slaves or freemen, and 
keep, sell, or buy them. To steal a freeman, says Grotius, is the highest 
kind of theft. In other instances we only steal human property, but when 
we steal or retain men in slavery, we seize those who, in common with our- 
selves, are constituted by the original grant, lords of the earth. Gen. 1 : 28. 
Vide Poli Synopsin in foe." 

BAPTISTS. 

"At a meeting of the General Committee of the Baptists of Virginia, in 
1783. the following point came up. — Semple 's Hist . of Baptists in Virginia. 

" Whether a petition should be offered to the General Assembly, praying 
that the yoke of slavery may be made more tolerable. Referred to the next 
session." 

" 1789. At this session the propriety of hereditary slavery was also 
taken up, and after some time employed in the consideration of the subject, 
the following resolution was offered by Eld. John Leland, and adopted : 

" Resolved, That slavery is a violent deprivation of the rights of nature, 
and inconsistent with republican government, and therefore (we) recommend 
it to our brethren to make use of every measure to extirpate this horrid 
evil from the land ; and pray Almighty God that our honorable legislature 
may have it in their power to proclaim the great jubilee, consistent with the 
principles of good policy." — " Facts for Baptist Churches,'''' p. 365. 

Action in Vermont. — The minutes of the Shaftsbury Asso- 
ciation, in 1792, contain an expression against the slave trade, 
and in favor of universal liberty. — lb. 

" According to Benedict (History of the Baptists, first edition), there was, 
in 1805, an Association of Baptists in Northern Kentucky, who separated 
themselves from slaveholding Baptists," &c. " Eld. David Barrow, once 
a Virginia slaveholder, became, after emancipating his slaves, one of their 
principal men. He wrote a pamphlet on slavery, entitled ' Involuntary, 
unmerited, perpetual, absolute, hereditary slavery, examined on the princi- 
ples of nature, reason, justice, policy, and Scripture.' — Other prominent 
advocates of these principles were, Elders Dodge, Carman, Sutton, Holmes, 
Tarrant, Grigg, and Smith." — lb. p. 366. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 109 



LEGISLATIVE AND JUDICIAL ACTION. 

Legislative and judicial action against slavery in several of 
the States, was the natural result of the moral and religious 
influences described in this and the preceding chapters, and 
on the whole the effects may be considered commensurate 
with the causes operating for the production of them. If it 
be said that the gradual and prospective emancipation pro- 
vided for by the legislatures of several States did not corres- 
pond with the doctrines of the inherent sinfulness of slavery 
and of the duty of immediate and unconditional abolition, 
insisted on by Hopkins and Edwards, and exemplified by 
some of the Congregational churches, it must be remembered 
that these testimonies were not fully received and adopted by 
some of the eminent statesmen at the head of the anti-slavery 
societies by whom these writings had been circulated. Ideas 
of supposed necessity, expediency, or convenience, were per- 
mitted to modify and control the direct and full application 
of principles admitted to be true and right in the abstract. 
Those testimonies, moreover, had been counteracted and neu- 
tralized by the gradual and tardy action, with few exceptions, 
of ecclesiastical bodies, including even the Society of Friends. 
It was hardly to be expected that the work of purification in 
the State would be more speedy and thorough than in the 
Church. 

A paragraph from an Appendix, by Dr. Hopkins, to the 
second edition of his Dialogue on Slavery, printed at New 
York, under sanction of the Manumission Society, in 1785 
embraces, in a few words, an account of the progress that had 
been made since the publication of the first edition, early in 
1776. 

" Since the publication of this Dialogue, many things have been done and 
steps taken towards a reformation of this evil. In the States of Massachu- 
setts and New Hampshire the slavery of the blacks is wholly abolished. 
And it is one of the fundamental articles in the Constitution of the proposed 
State of Vermont, that no slavery shall be tolerated there. The States of 
Rhode Island, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, and the lower counties of the 



110 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

Delaware, have provided for the gradual abolition of slavery, and have 
ordered that all the blacks who shall be hereafter born in these States, shall 
be free at a certain age, and that no more slaves shall be introduced among 
thein. And the State of Virginia has repealed a law, which was formerly 
in force there, against the freeing of the blacks, and now allows the masters 
of slaves to free them when they please. Thus, all the States but five,* 
have manifested a disposition to promote the freedom of the Africans. t 
And numbers of slaves have been liberated by their masters, under a con- 
viction of the unrighteousness of holding them in slavery. This is a great 
advance in the desired reformation, and has given ground to hope that 
slavery will be ivholly abolished in all the United States of America." 

To this it might have been added, that " in the Convention 
that formed the Constitution of Kentucky, in 1780, the effort 
to prohibit slavery was nearly successful." " But for the 
great influence of two large slaveholders — Messrs. Breckin- 
ridge and Nicholson " — the measure, it is believed, would 
have been carried. — " Power of Congress" &c. p. 34. 

Virginia, in 1786, enacted that every slave imported into 
the Commonwealth should be free. 

It is to be lamented that Virginia should have since 
re-enacted her laws against emancipation, and in many ways 
sought to strengthen the slave system. In Delaware, too, 
there must have been some retrograde steps, though the num- 
ber of slaves has greatly diminished since 1785. 

In 1777, the people of Vermont met in Convention and 
proclaimed Vermont an independent State. The first article 
of their bill of rights excluded slavery. Though not admit- 
ted into the Confederacy (owing to some claims of New York) 
till 1789, Vermont has the honor of having first provided for 
the abolition of slavery. Seventeen slaves are indeed set 

* The statement should have been six, viz. New York, Maryland, New Jersey, the 
two Carolina*, and Georgia. Vermont, a new State, having been reckoned, there 
were fourteen States then in the Union, instead of the original thirteen, in the mind 
of the writer. 

t Virginia and Delaware, it seems, were then counted upon as being on the side 
of freedom, while New York and New Jersey were reckoned on the other side. 
Another fact to be adjusted to the current theory of constitutional guaranties, which 
would present to us New York and New Jersey refusing to come into the Union, 
unless Virginia and Delaware would enter into the "compact" to hunt fugitive 
slaves, &c. ! 

c 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. Ill 

down to Vermont in the census of 1790. The revised Con- 
stitution of 1793 retains the prohibition of slavery. 

" In Massachusetts, it was judicially declared, soon after the Revolution, 
that slavery was virtually abolished by the Constitution, and that the issue 
of a female slave, though born prior to the Constitution, was born free." — 
Kent's Commentary, p. 252. 

" In Massachusetts, all the negroes in the Commonwealth were, by their 
new Constitution, liberated in a day, and none of the ill consequences 
objected, followed, either to the Commonwealth or to individuals." — Appen- 
dix, by Dr. Edwards, to his Scrmoii against Slavery, Sept. 15, 1791. 

In giving the opinion of the Court in the case of the Com- 
monwealth versus Thomas Aves, in 1833, Chief Justice Shaw 

said : — 

u How, or by what act particularly, slavery was abolished in Massachu- 
setts, whether by the adoption of the opinion in Somerset's case, as a decla- 
ration and modification of the Common Law, or by the Declaration of 
Independence, or by the [State] Constitution of 1780, it is not now very 
easy to determine, and it is a matter rather of curiosity than utility, it being 
agreed on all hands that, if not abolished before, it was so by the declara- 
tion of rights." * * * " Without pursuing this inquiry further, it is 
sufficient for the purpose of the case before us, that by the Constitution 
adopted in 1780, slavery was abolished in Massachusetts, upon the ground 
that it is contrary to natural right and the plain principles of justice. 
The terms of the first article of the Declaration of Rights are clear and 
explicit. ' All men are born free and equal, and have certain natural, essen- 
tial, and inalienable rights, which are the right of enjoying and defending 
their lives and liberties, that of acquiring, possessing, and protecting pro- 
perty.' — It would be difficult to select words more precisely adapted to the 
abolition of slavery." — Pickering's Reports, pp. 209-10. 

The suggestion of Chief Justice Shaw, that slavery may 
have been abolished in Massachusetts by the National Declara- 
tion of Independence, may be startling to some readers, but 
the similarity, not to say identity of that declaration with the 
article in the Massachusetts Constitution, and the coincidence 
of both with the well known powers of the Common Law, as 
applied and exemplified "in Somerset's case," may induce the 
inquiry whether or how either one of the three " acts " speci- 
fied by Judge Shaw could have had power to abolish slavery, 
unless either of the others possessed likewise the same power? 



112 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

The answer to this query seems suggested by the intimation 
of Judge Shaw, that " it is matter rather of curiosity than 
utility" to fix upon a selection of the implements or " acts" 
of freedom.* 

The first Federal Census, 1790, contains no enumeration of 
slaves in Massachusetts. 

In Pennsylvania a law was passed the first of March, 1780, 
declaring all persons born in the State after that day, to be 
free at the age of twenty-eight years. Penalty seventy-five 
pounds for carrying a slave beyond the limits of the State.f 

The first section of this act, of the nature of a preamble, 
recapitulates the condition into which the colonies were ex- 
pected to be reduced by the tj^ranny of Great Britain, the 
grateful sense due for so great a providential deliverance, and 
the corresponding obligation and privilege of extending the 
blessings of freedom to others. The second section brings 
directly into view the condition of the negro slaves, and the 
demands of justice on their behalf, and then proceeds to the 
enactment above described. 

There were those, it would seem, who were not satisfied 



* Since writing the above, the following item reaches us through a new work of 
Mr. Spooner — " A Defence for Fugitive Slaves." We deem it altogether too impor- 
tant to be omitted here: 

'■As early as 1770, and two years previous to the decision of Somerset's ease, so 
famous in England, the right of a master to hold a slave had been denied by the 
Superior Court of Massachusetts, and upon the same grounds, substantially, as those 
upon which Lord Mansfield discharged Somerset, when Ms case came before lain. The 
ease here alluded to was James vs. Leehmere, brought by the plaintiff, a negro, 
against his master, to recover his freedom." — Washburn's Judicial History of Mas- 
sachusetts, p. 202. 

That slaves should have been held in Massachusetts after this decision, that a new 
judicial decision should have been needed after the Revolution, and that Chief Jus- 
tice Shaw, in 1833, should have been at a loss to fix, with precision, the earliest date 
and the grounds of the previous decisions, are very remarkable circumstances, all 
tending to illustrate the facility with which the practice of slaveholding has been 
continued, contrary to law, and the inattention of learned jurists to the facts as well 
as the law, on the subject. 

The case mentioned hy Washburn confirms very strongly the impression that 
slavery was as illegal in the Colonies, before the Revolution, as it is known a£id 
admitted to have been in England. 

t Genius of Temperance, Sept. 19, 1833, copied from Emancipator. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 113 

with this partial and tardy justice. " Petitions in favor of the 
oppressed Africans" were again presented to the Legislature 
in 1798, and a committee made a favorable report, March 8. 
They intimated that if the Bill of Eights, the Declaration of 
Independence, and the paternal character and overruling 
providence of a common Creator, were to be recognized, " the 
petitioners but speak the divine will, in requesting that this 
evil be done away from the land."* 

Of the specific points of this petition, and of the legislative 
action had on it, we are not informed. The United States 
census for Pennsylvania, in 1790, exhibits 3,737 slaves, and 
in 1810, sixty-four. 

It deserves notice that the efforts of that period had refer- 
ence to the removal of slavery "from the land," and not 
merely from particular portions of it. 

In New Hampshire, slavery was said to have been abolished, 
by constitutional declarations of rights, similar to those of 
Massachusetts, adopted in 1783, and taking effect in June, 
1781. And yet, singularly enough, the census of 1790 shows 
158 slaves in New Hampshire, and even that of 1810 gives 
one ! By what tenure, and under what circumstances or pre- 
texts slaves are held in New Hampshire, we are not informed. 
State Constitutions, it seems, as well as National Declarations,, 
may be violated in practice, but the legality of such practices 
presents another question — the same that was agitated by 
Granville Sharp in Great Britain. 

Rhode Island, the very seat of the African Slave Trade, 
was the seat also of early efforts in favor of freedom. The 
exact date, or the precise form of the earliest legislative move- 
ments are not before us, but a note of Dr. Hopkins to his 
Dialogue, in 1776, mentions a proposed act, prohibiting the 
importation of negroes into this colony, and asserting the 
rights of freedom of all those hereafter born or manumitted 
within the same." He gives the preamble to this proposed 
act in the followino; words : 



Statutes of Pennsylvania, vide Xational Era, Aug. 22, 1S50. 
8 



114 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

" Whereas, the inhabitants of America are generally engaged in the 
preservation of their own rights and liberties, among which those of per- 
sonal freedom must be considered as tbe greatest ; and, as those who are 
desirous of enjoying all the advantages of liberty themselves should be 
willing to extend personal liberty to others, therefore, be it enacted," &c. 

"Is it possible," exclaims Hopkins, "that anyone should 
not feel the irresistible force of this reason ?" In a note to 
the second edition, in 1785, he adds: 

" Since the above was published, the General Assembly of that State 
have made a law, that all the blacks born in it after March, 1781, are made 
free. And the masters who have slaves under forty years old, are autho- 
rized to free them, without being bound to support them if afterwards they 
should be unable to support themselves." 

The census of 1790 reports 952 slaves in Khode Island, and 
in 1840, five. 

■ In Connecticut, a law providing for the gradual abolition 
of slavery was enacted in 1781. In 1790, the number of 
slaves in that State was 2,759; in 1810, there were only sev- 
enteen. 

In New York, " in 1799, an act of gradual emancipation 
was passed, declaring all children born thereafter to be free, 
males when coming to the age of twenty-eight, and females at 
twenty-five. A fine of two hundred and fifty dollars was the 
penalty, and the freedom of the slave was the result of an 
attempt to sell him out of the State. Although masters were 
allowed to travel with their slaves, yet under severe lines 
they were obliged to return them ; or, under oath, to make 
proof that unavoidable accident prevented the returning. 

" In 1817 another act was passed, declaring all slaves to be 
free in 1827, and on July 4th of that year the act took effect, 
and every slave, nearly ten thousand, was manumitted tvitlioui 
comjx-nsation to their oivners."* 

And yet, from some cause, the census for 1840 reports four 
slaves in the State of New York. In 1790 there were 21,324, 
being nearly three-fourths as many as there were in Georgia 



H. W. Beeehcr, j\'ew York Tribune, June 1, 1850. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 115 

at that time, nearly twice as many as there were then in Ken- 
tucky, and more than six times as many as there were in Ten- 
nessee ! The proportion, when the Federal Constitution was 
adopted a year or two previous, could not have greatly varied, 
throwing New York, at that time, and for several years after- 
wards, somewhat conspicuously, into the ranks of the Slave 
States. Even down to 1800 there were 20,343 slaves, the 
number having decreased but 881 in ten years. 

New Jersey took measures, in 1804, for the prospective 
abolition of slavery, but the process must have been a tardy 
one. In 1790 the number of slaves was 11,423. In 1840, it 
was 674. 

In 1820 an act was passed emancipating all slaves born 
after 1805 at the age of twenty-five years, and imposing a fine 
of one hundred dollars and imprisonment for transporting 
slaves beyond the limits of the State, except slaves of full age 
who freely consented to go, before a judge of one of the courts 
in private. — Statutes of New Jersey, Congress Library. National 
Era, August 22, 1850. 

In April, 1846, a law was passed and approved, ostensibly 
abolishing slavery, and declaring that every person then held 
in slavery was free, subject, however, to certain restrictions, 
which retain the same persons under the control of their mas- 
ters, for an indefinite period, as apprentices. They are to '' serve 
until discharged," and the master is permitted "to discharge 
them by a writing executed in the presence of at least one 
witness, provided the apprentice be of sound mind, and capa- 
ble of procuring a livelihood, and upon certificate of the over- 
seers of the poor and two j ustices of the peace, to such capa- 
city," &c., &c. Such is the definition of freedom, and of the 
abolition of slavery, in New Jersey ! — M88L by Gov. Haines. 

The census of 1840 records 3 slaves in Ohio, 3 in Indiana, 
331 in Illinois, 11 in Wisconsin, and 16 in. Iowa. The only 
States, at that time, without slaves, were Massachusetts, Maine, 
Vermont, and Michigan. A short list of really non-slave- 
holding States ! 

In the States now commonly denominated non-slaveholding, 



116 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

there were, in 1776, by computation, 46,099 slaves. In 1790 
there were, by census, 40,870. In 1840, there were 1,129. 

This decrease, though chiefly the effect of legislative and 
judical action, was not wholly so. By voluntary manumis- 
sions, the slave population must have been very essentially 
diminished. Particularly must this have been the case in 
Rhode Island, where the dimunition between 1776 and lTP^, 
an interval of only fourteen years, was from 4,370 to 932, 
since the law of 1784 liberating only those who were born 
after that time, could have operated only to a very limited 
extent, in checking the increase of slave population. In 
Pennsylvania, too, where legislation had only liberated those 
born after 1780, we find the decrease of slaves between the 
years 1776 and 1790, to have been from 10,000 to 3,737. 
Church action, rather' than legislative or judicial, is to be 
credited with these manumissions in Pennsylvania and Khode 
Island. 

It is somewhat remarkable that South Carolina, between 
1776 and 1790, exhibits a decrease of slave population, from 
* 110,000 to 107,094, while the slaves of New York, in the 
same time, increased from 15,000 to 21,824. But the num- 
ber of slaves in S. Carolina had increased, in 1840, to 
327,038. 

The increase of slavery in the Southern States, presents a 
striking contrast to the decrease in the Northern and Eastern 
States. In 1776 the number of slaves in these is computed at 
456,000. In 1790, by census, it was, 567,527. In 1840, it 
was 2,486,126, including the District of Columbia. 

Thus, while in one part of the country, the slave population 
increased from less than half a million to nearly two and a 
half millions, in another part of the country it was diminished 
from above 46,000 to a little more than 1,100. 

This diminution, whether in the form of voluntary manu- 
missions, or in consequence of legislative or judicial action, 
may be traced, almost entirely, to the moral, religious and 
political influences, exhibited in this and the preceding- 
chapters. But for these, the eastern, middle, and north-western 



SLAVERY AND* FREEDOM. 117 

States — in despite of all that has been said of soil and climate 
— would probably have been overspread with the foul stain 
and the blighting curse of slaveholding. It was the prevail- 
ing moral sentiment of the North that led to the abolition of 
slavery there. This is manifest from the fact that the eman- 
cipated slaves and their children, are for the most part, still to 
be found at the North. They were not, in anticipation of 
emancipation acts, exported to other States, to any observable 
extent. 

When, in 1827, ten thousand slaves were, in one day, set 
free, in the State of New York, they remained on the soil, 
and it is not known that a single slave had been sold into 
another State, in anticipation of that long expected event. 
Transportation has never been made, in these States, a condi- 
tion of freedom ; nor, until after the organization of the 
Colonization Society, was their removal sought as an advantage 
to the communities in which they resided. 



118 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 



CHAPTER XL 

DECLINE OF THE SPIRIT OF LIBERTY, AND GROWTH OF SLAVERY, 
SINCE THE REVOLUTION — THEIR CAUSES AND EARLY MANI- 
FESTATIONS. 

Importance of tracing disastrous social changes to their moral causes — Promises 
made in adversity forgotten in prosperity — View of Dr. Hopkins — A humiliating 
fact — Partial revival of the Slave Trade — Fallacy of expecting to abolish the traffic 
during the existence of Slavery — The strategy of postponement — General decline 
of Religion and Morals — Disbanding of the Army — Habits of idleness, a«d ten- 
dency to Piracy and Slave Trade — Relaxation of vigilance — Decline of public 
spirit — Vicissitudes of poverty and returning wealth — Concentration and control 
of capital — Anti-Democratic Conservatism, and semi-infidel French Democracy — 
The two rival parties — Misunderstood " horrors of St. Domingo"- — Unforeseen 
profitableness of cotton-growing — Unequal apportionment of representation — 
Declining standard of morals in the Church — Rivalry of the Sects — Growing pre- 
judice against color — Influence of the Colonization project — Fatal fostering of 
this prejudice — corroborated by estimate of Henry Clay. 

The study of history is like a journey, or an exploring tour, 
in the course of which, cheering prospects are sometimes 
unexpectedly succeeded by scenes less promising, but 
necessary to be traversed, or the proposed end is not reached. 
If we would faithfully explore a country, we must not con- 
fine our attention to the pleasant portions of it. If we 
would improve it, we must acquaint ourselves with the 
unseemly features and untoward influences to be removed 
or remedied. If fields once fertile are becoming sterile, 
we must learn under what modes of tillage they have become 
so. If the buildings just erected and yet unfinished, are 
beginning to crumble, we must inquire after the nature of the 
materials, and the process of the structure. 

The marked decline of the spirit of liberty in this country 
for half a century after the Revolution, is a fact too palpable 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 119 

to escape notice. Between the historical details of the last 
three chapters, and those that must appear in the following, 
there will be found, we fear, a chasm too wide and abrupt to 
comport with the ordinary vicissitudes of credible history. 
To the reader, of another country, or a future age, we shall 
appear to have been writing fiction, and even the verity of the 
public documents cited, will scarcely escape suspicion. But 
" truth is stranger than fiction." The details to be presented 
will appear credible enough when we shall have become con- 
versant with the moral causes at work beforehand, adapted to 
the production of them. To the reader who never stops to 
inquire after moral causes, or who reads on, without keeping 
them steadily in mind, the perusal of history can be of little 
value. It can supply him with no guide to the future, no 
element of congruity for the past. Such causes constitute, in 
reality, the most essential ingredient of true history. They 
are facts, at wholesale, fountains of facts, from whence all 
minor facts flow. We make no digression, then, in stating 
them. We cannot promise a complete enumeration of all 
these causes. We may not be able, always, to distinguish 
causes from effects, nor to designate the precise point, in the 
history, where the defection began, nor decide positively what 
portion of the body politic was first corrupted, or first became 
corrupting. But we can note down a kw general facts. 

1. We shall first venture to suggest, that the regard for 
human liberty, and the opposition to the slave trade and 
slavery, that were manifested during the revolutionary period, 
may have failed to prove permanent and abiding, because, in 
respect to great numbers of the people, including some promi- 
nent citizens, those sentiments were not as deep seated and as 
disinterested as they should have been, and therefore a change 
in the aspect of public affairs would naturally bring with it a 
change in the manifestation of such sentiments. To suppose 
otherwise would be to suppose an unprecedented purity of 
purpose, of which no other nation has yet furnished a parallel. 
This suggestion does not discredit the fact of an actual declen- 
sion. It only indicates one of the causes of it. Without any 



120 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

previous tendency to declension, other causes would have had 
little power. 

It is easy to see, that, in many ways, the revolutionary pe- 
riod presented peculiar inducements to the abolition of the 
slave trade and slavery. To fight for their own liberties while 
enslaving others, was an incongruity too glaring to consist 
with national reputation, or with intelligent self-respect. Like 
all other men, in times of pressing danger and sore calamity, 
our fathers might make solemn promises of amendment, which 
would be liable to be forgotten and disregarded, on the return of 
security and peace. The fear of an insurrection of the slaves, 
or of their desertion to the enemy, in time of war, might pre- 
sent an argument in favor of their emancipation, that would 
influence many minds, until the danger had passed away. 
Such, indeed, was the fact. A note of Dr. Hopkins to his 
Dialogue, in 1776, will place this fact in a clear and impres- 
sive light. 

" God is so ordering it, in his providence, that it seems absolutely neces- 
sary that something should speedily be done in respect to the slaves among 
us, in order to our safety, and to prevent their turning against us, in our 
present struggle, in order to get their liberty. Our oppressors have 
planned to gain the blacks, and induce them to take up arms against us, by 
promising them liberty on this condition ; and this plan they are prose- 
cuting to the utmost of their power, by which means they have persuaded 
numbers to join them. And should we attempt to restrain them by force 
and severity, keeping a strict guard over them, and punishing those severely 
who shall be detected in attempting to join our opposers, this will be only 
making bad worse, and serve to render our inconsistency and cruelty more 
criminal, perspicuous, and shocking, and bring down the righteous ven- 
geance of heaven on our heads. The only way pointed out to prevent this 
threatening evil, is to set the blacks at liberty ourselves, by some public act 
and laws, and then give them encouragement to labor, or take up arms in 
defence of the American cause, as they shall choose. This would, at once, 
be doing them some degree of justice, and defeating our enemies in the 
scheme they are prosecuting." 

This wise and righteous counsel was not followed, but it is 
impossible to tell how extensively the slaves were kept quiet, 
by the public testimonies made in favor of their freedom, and 
by the hopes thus inspired. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 121 

In his Dialogue, Dr. Hopkins had insisted so strongly on 
the tokens of divine displeasure hanging over the nation, on 
account of this crying sin, that on the re-publication of the 
work, after the return of peace, he thought it necessary, in an 
Appendix, to notice the objection, that if slavery were so 
great a national sin, as had been represented, Divine Provi- 
dence would not have favored the cause of America ; and 
therefore, the representations that had been made of the dan- 
ger of defeat, in consequence of this wickedness and incon- 
sistency, had been unfounded and rash. One answer of Dr. 
Hopkins to this objection, was, that " since the publication of 
this dialogue, many things have been done and steps taken, 
towards a reformation of this evil " — proceeding to enumerate, 
(as we have before quoted,) the States that had either abol- 
ished slavery or taken measures in that direction. He adds, 
that if these hopeful beginnings, commenced in times of afllic- 
tion, were not followed up and completed in prosperity, we 
may expect divine judgments, still. And here, he quotes as 
applicable to this country, in such a case, that remarkable 
passage in the prophecy of Jeremiah, Chapter 35, where it is 
recorded that the king and princes of Judah, in a time of 
siege and distress entered into a solemn "resolution and cove- 
nant to free all their slaves "—but " when their fears and 
distress were removed, they returned to their former practice," 
— for which God commissioned Jeremiah to tell them that 
since they had " refused liberty to their brethren, he would 
proclaim a liberty for them, even a most dreadful liberty to 
the sword, to the pestilence, and to the famine, and cause 
them to be removed into all the kingdoms of the earth," &c. 

The contrast between Hopkins and some of his successors, 
in the same religious denomination in New England, who 
have recently applauded the efforts of our most recreant poli- 
ticians to draw, still closer, the fetters of the enslaved, and to 
punish those who shelter the outcasts, is too palpable and 
glaring to escape observation : and the question forces itself 
upon our attention, notwithstanding their technical agreement 
in creeds and forms, whether teachers so opposite in their 



122 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

practical expositions, should be regarded as teaching, in 
reality, the same religion, and serving the same Master. 

It is in the same connection, in that Appendix, that Dr. 
Hopkins notices the pecuniary troubles and distresses that 
still, at that time, (1785) embarrassed the country, and threat- 
ened its ruin, in evidence that the danger of divine judgments 
had not yet disappeared. And as a reason for fearing yet 
greater judgments, he proceeds to mention, what belongs to 
this portion of our history, as an important, but painfully hu- 
miliating fact. Though the General Congress and the Colonies 
or States had solemnly covenanted to discontinue the slave traf- 
fic, and had interdicted it, yet, by prominent and wealthy indi- 
viduals, it was now beginning, on the return of peace, to be 
revived, and was not effectually suppressed by the authorities. 
We will state this in the words of that celebrated author. 

" We are again going into the practice of that seven-fold abomination, 
the slave trade, against which, in the beginning of the war, we bore public 
testimony, and entered into a united and solemn resolution wholly to re- 
nounce it, and all connection with those who should persist in this evil 
practice. A number of vessels have been sent from some of the States in 
New England, and other States, to A.frica, to procure slaves, and they are 
in such demand in the West Indies, and in some of the Southern States, and 
especially South Carolina, that several successful voyages have been made, 
thousands of slaves brought into these United States, and sold at extraor- 
dinary prices, by which others are tempted and encouraged to go into this 
trade, and there is a prospect that it will take place to as great a degree as 
it has heretofore, unless it should be suppressed by those in public authority, 
or by the people at large." 

The precise extent to which this infamous traffic was re- 
sumed, cannot now be ascertained. But there is reason to 
think it was quite limited, until (as before stated) it was al- 
lowed by South Carolina, in 1803. 

2. The experiment of putting a stop to the slave trade 
during the existence of slavery — and the policy of attempting 
to abolish either the one or the other, or both of them, by the 
mere force of moral suasion, without corresponding and ade- 
quate political action, was fully tried by the philanthropists 
and patriots of the revolutionary period, and with a result 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 123 

that should prove a caution to all their successors who may 
be engaged in the cause of human freedom. To maintain 
penal laws against any other forms of crime, and permit this 
crime of crimes to go " unwhipt of justice," is a solecism in 
legislation, in jurisprudence, and in civil polity, without a 
parallel for inconsistency and folly. This capital error we put 
down as one of the leading causes or outstanding signs of the 
lamentable defection of this nation from the principles of civil 
government they had marked out for themselves, in their 
declaration of human rights, and their definition of the ob- 
jects and characteristics of a legitimate and just civil govern- 
ment. 

3. " The ruse of gradualism " — the strategy of delay — the 
contamination of temporary compromise, was another kindred 
error, (if it may be called another) and the same with which 
the friends of liberty have been frequently beset, and some- 
times foiled, in their more recent as well as more early en- 
deavors. 

4. The general decline of pure religion and sound morality, 
after the close of the revolutionary struggle, another fact com- 
monly noticed by the better portion of the community at that 
period, was almost certain to include in it a decline of the 
spirit of liberty, of a tender regard for human rights, and of 
sensibility to the flagrant iniquities of the slave trade and 
slavery. 

Though the war of the Kevolution contributed, in many 
respects, and with the better portion of society, to foster the 
spirit of freedom ; yet, like other wars, it had its demoralizing- 
tendencies, and the disbanding of the army was the occasion 
for the development of them. Not a few of the soldiers, and 
some of the officers, had contracted a distaste for the habits 
of sober and patient industry, in which they had, in earlier 
life, been educated ; and, to a frightful extent, the spirit of 
lawlessness and licentiousness had been mistaken for the spirit 
of freedom. The spirit of gambling adventure, amid the 
pecuniary fluctuations of that period, and the depreciation of 
the continental paper currency, contributed its share to pro- 



124 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

duce the recklessness, unscrupulousness, and hap-hazard ad- 
venture for which a considerable portion of that generation 
were distinguished. The anti-slavery writings of a Hopkins 
and an Edwards can hardly be supposed to have had much 
effect upon this class of society, who had learned to cast off 
their respect for moral and religious instructions and restraints 
in general. The rapid inroads of intemperance, profanity, 
and irreligion, were among the marked features of that period, 
even in New England, as we learn from the testimonies of 
such Avriters as Emmons. The class of the community just 
alluded to, were ripe for any unlawful enterprise rather than 
for patient, quiet rural labor. The slave trade, as well as 
other forms of piracy, was not lacking for men of this class 
to man its vessels, and even to take charge of them, as super- 
cargoes and captains. And in how many ways the character- 
istics of such an age would tend to strengthen and perpetuate 
slavery, we need not stop to describe. 

5. A general decline of the spirit of liberty succeeded to 
the exhausting struggles of the Revolution, almost by a law of 
the human mind, if we may adventure to say so, a process in 
human affairs very difficult to be counteracted, except by the 
most resolute and disinterested exertions. The one idea of 
national independence, which had come to stand as the syno- 
nym of the idea of freedom, had so long held the mind of the 
nation in an agony of attention and suspense, that when the 
struggle was over, and the national independence acknow- 
ledged, it was taken for granted that the liberties of the nation 
were secured. Even with the most philosophical and philan- 
thropic, a vague, indefinite, and ill-conceived impression of 
the " spirit of the age " as it is called, that was to carry every- 
body onward and upward to the dignity of freemen, without 
the exhausting cares, anxieties, and solicitudes of those who 
had almost worn themselves out in the long struggle, had 
operated as a welcome furlough, or discharge from service. 
When the army and the commander-in-chief were permitted 
to retire from the public defence, why should not they ? The 
human mind, so long and so intensely kept on the stretch, 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 125 

sought repose, and, unhappily, in this case, before the giant 
despotism of the age had been vanquished. Even the strong- 
minded and the keen-sighted failed to perceive this! How 
much more the masses of the people, whose vigilance and 
combined efforts were then needed? Withdrawing their 
attention too much from public affairs, they expended their 
strength on their own personal and domestic concerns, that 
now needed unusual care, after a season of comparative neg- 
lect. A people impoverished by a seven years' war, were 
now to replenish their exhausted stores, and pay off their 
public and private debts, at a time when the proportion of 
producers had been diminished, first by the demands of the 
war, and next, by the flood of idlers, or worse than idlers, 
which had come with the return of peace. How easily would 
most men excuse themselves from anti-slavery agitation at 
such a period, to say nothing of an unwillingness to hazard, 
afresh, at the close of a civil war, the amicable relations that 
remained. In all this we see a cause, not an adequate excuse, 
for the general apathy that succeeded to the revolutionary 
struggle. The lesson for our instruction is, the importance of 
never relinquishing a contest for freedom, till it is thoroughly 
secured, or of never yielding a moral controversy till it is 
settled on the right basis. 

C. When the private and the public purse were replenished, 
when prosperity had succeeded to poverty, when wealth, at 
the opening of the present century, rolled in upon the nation, 
the former habits of disinterested or even of patriotic devotion 
to public affairs and the interests of human freedom did not 
return. The pursuit of wealth had begotten the inordinate 
love of it. Inattention to the demands of liberty and justice 
had resulted in the disregard of them. Inequality of posses- 
sion, continually increasing and in striking contrast to earlier 
times, had undermined the spirit of equality, and introduced 
aristocratic tastes. Humanity and human rights were less 
valued than wealth. The concentration of capital created a 
new element of political power, and diverted it from its former 
channels. The possession of wealth, or of talents prostituted 



126 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

to the support of its claims, instead of a disinterested advocacy 
of human liberty and equal justice, supplied passports to seats 
in the State and National Councils, to places of authority and 
power. Here was another cause, and another step in the 
downward tendencies of the nation ; the beginning of that 
powerful aristocracy of wealth that afterwards openly opposed 
the discussion of the slave question. 

7. Earlier than this, and somewhat if not altogether dis- 
tinct from it in the first place, though afterwards learning to 
combine with it, and becoming at length wholly absorbed in 
it, and obliterated by it, was a more elevated aristocracy, (not 
using the word in its most odious sense,) beginning to exhibit 
itself, almost immediately after the close of the revolutionary 
struggle. In the effort to establish a national Constitution, to 
organize a new general government, and to mark out a course 
of national policy, this element became distinctly visible. It 
might be described as the aristocracy of intellect, combined, 
to a great extent, (though with some marked exceptions,) 
with high moral worth, which, in the absence of numbers, 
gave it, for a time, great weight and power. It was not so 
much, if at all, an aristocracy of misanthropy or of gross sel- 
fishness, as of conscious superiority of intelligence and char- 
acter, and a distrust in the capacities of the mass of the people 
for self-government. With a goodly share of the friends of 
humanity and justice in its ranks, (the friends of the enslaved,) 
seeking earnestly their future or ultimate freedom, it never- 
theless failed to yield its full assent to those self-evident truths 
of the Declaration of Independence which must lie at the 
basis of any consistent and thorough agitation for the present 
removal of slavery. If the masses of the people could not 
safely be intrusted with the experiment of self-government, 
as this class of statesmen seem to have supposed, it would 
have been the consummation of folly and madness to have 
set the slaves all loose, at once, without any previous prepar- 
ation for freedom. Even the professedly democratic portion 
of our public men were, by no means, prepared to apply their 
principles to the case of the unlettered and uncultivated negro 



SLAVEKY AND FREEDOM. 127 

population, though they were willing to hazard the experi- 
ment with the more favored and better educated whites. 
"Was it to be expected, then, of those who trembled at the 
experiment of republican institutions even for the educated 
yeomanry of New England, without the protecting shadow of 
a royal throne, or its equivalent in some form — those who 
sought to restrict as much as possible the right of suffrage, 
making property the evidence of qualification ; those who 
sought for balances and checks against the people, and the 
placing of the highest officers of government at the greatest 
practicable distance from their control — was it to be expected, 
we demand, of such a school of statesmen, that they should 
signalize themselves by demanding the immediate and uncon- 
ditional emancipation of the enslaved ? Most assuredly it was 
not. And no such anomaly was witnessed. Admit that they 
embodied a majority of the most intelligent, respectable, phil- 
anthropic, and religious portion of the community, as has 
been plausibly, and perhaps justly, claimed for them — admit 
that among their prominent men were some of the most pro- 
minent and worthy patrons of manumission, and even of aboli- 
tion societies — admit that they favored the circulation of the 
more radical and truly democratic anti-slavery doctrines of 
llopkins and Edwards- — it nevertheless remains true that no 
prominent statesman of this class, (nor even of their more 
democratic opponents,) proposed an immediate and uncondi- 
tional abolition of slavery. The democratic theory of human 
rights and corresponding capabilities, was not then sufficiently 
understood, to warrant such a movement. We mention this 
as an indisputable and important historical fact — not for any 
purposes of invidious reproach. If the best friends of the en- 
slaved among our purest and most prominent statesmen were 
not ready to demand for them immediate justice, then their 
continued enslavement was a matter of course, until the rise 

* We cannot say that Hopkins and Edwards were not both identified, in their 
political influence, as most of their clerical associates were, with the school of poli- 
tics we have described. It would be remarkable if they were not. But their 
writings on slavery are among the most radically democratic of their times. 



128 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

and ascendency of the slave power riveted their chains. The 
fact and philosophy of gradualism, and consequent postpone- 
ment, has, in part, its historical elucidation just here. 

Fidelity to historical truth compels us to add, that the class 
of statesmen just described exerted a powerful influence in 
moulding the Federal Constitution ; that they distinguished 
themselves and obtained their political name, as Federalists, by 
advocating its adoption ; that the administration of the Federal 
Government, on its first organization, came into their hands; 
that they administered it for the first twelve years, during 
which time the national policy was gradually but substantially 
settled upon the basis upon which it has been administered 
ever since,* so far as the slave question is concerned, only that 
the exorbitant demands of the slave power have been con- 
stantly " growing with its growth, and strengthening with its 
strength." 

O 

Impartiality requires us to notice these facts concerning the 
Federal party while in power, as the Democratic party so 
called, is justly obnoxious to the charge of violating, even 
more conspicuously and outrageously, the free principles of 
which they boast, during their much longer administration of 
the government in after years. 

The want of a thorough, consistent, and Christian demo- 
cracy, therefore, is distinctly visible in the origin and continu- 
ation of the pro-slavery policy of the national government, 
and to this fact, as to a comprehensive cause, the present 
ascendency of the slave power may be traced. Had the 
" Federalists " been more democratic in their theory of civil 
government — had the "Democrats" (or "Republicans," as 
they were then called) reduced their own theory to practice,! 



* Facts, in evidence of tins, will be adduced in the proper connection of the 
history. 

+ Having never belonged to either of those parties, nor voted more than twice or 
thrice before the formation of the Liberty party in 1810, (though an attentive wit- 
ness of party struggles since 1804,) the writer hoped to have presented a picture 
which would have been admitted by all the intelligent friends of liberty to be a just 
and impartial one. But on submitting his manuscript to the inspection of judicious 
friends, he finds his mistake. He now makes up his mind that some good men of 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 129 

the system of American slavery would have been abolished 
at an early period of our history. 

8. In close connection with the preceding facts, it should 
be noticed that the excesses of the first French Revolution, 
commencing soon after our Federal Government went into 
operation, must have contributed largely, as Ave .know it did, 
to bring democratic principles into disrepute, to increase and 
fortify the jealousies and fears of conscrvatists, and confirm 
the impression of insecurity to life, to property, and to civil 
order, if large masses of men should at once be released from 
absolute control. If millions of educated and polished French- 
men could not be transferred at once from a state of mere polit- 
ical servility to a state of civil and political freedom, without 
becoming fired with the frenzy of demons, abjuring all the 
restraints of religion, subverting the state, proscribing the 
church, engulfing society and property in the wildest chaos 
of disorder ; drenching the land with blood, and exterminat- 
ing each other by the rapid succession and violent proscrip- 
tion of rival factions, how could it be thought safe or prudent 
to release suddenly from a state of still deeper degradation a 
more ignorant population of slaves ? Thus it must have been 
that men reasoned, especially that portion of them whose pre- 
vious jealousy of popular ascendency had been so unequivo- 
cally manifested, who looked upon these trans-atlantic devel- 
opments with unmingled horror, and pointed to them as 
evidences in confirmation of their predictions. Even the 
most sanguine and democratic among our American statesmen, 
and those who had most joyfully hailed the dawn of liberty 
in France, were compelled, though reluctantly, at length to 
join in the general condemnation of such excesses, and to feel 
if they could not re-echo the appeals now so eloquently made 

opposite parties will think him unjust to their party. No course seems to remain 
for him but the expression of his own convictions. He has no desire nor temptation 
to follow the bad custom of abusing the obsolete Federal party, the representative 
of a former age. A more honest and patriotic party never administered the govern- 
ment. We have only attributed to it a defective theory, consistently followed — a 
less reprehensible error than that of its opponent, the holding of a better theory ia 
abeyauce, for the sake of pro-slavery support and the spoils of offico. 

9 



130 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

concerning the clangers of such freedom. If a conclusion 
adverse to the sudden emancipation of the slaves was not 
logically deduced and propounded in the form of a syllogism, 
the impression must have been effectually made. The horrors 
of the French Ee volution, like the perverted story of " the 
horrors of St. Domingo,"* some time afterwards, have ever 
since been on the lips of the conservators of slavery. So late 
as the beginning of the present anti-slavery agitation, in 1833, 
the "reign of terror" in France, and "the horrors of St. 
Domingo," were successfully adverted to by opposers ; and 
the doctrines of immediate and unconditional emancipation, 
as taught by Edwards, were systematically confounded with 
the " Jacobinism of the first French Revolution " — a misre- 
presentation less excusable now, than during the dimness and 
confusion near the close of the last century. 

9. This untoward influence of the French Revolution was 
increased by the undeniable fact, that a leaven of the French 
infidelity, and the maxims of disorganization, had insinuated 
themselves into the ranks of the democratic party in this 
country, and appeared to find favor with some of the popular 
leaders of that school, some of whom had advocated slave 
emancipation. The cry of the French atheists — " No mon- 
arch in heaven, no monarch on earth," if not re-echoed in this 



* The story of St. Domingo, correctly told, gives no countenance to the idea of 
the dangers of emancipation. The first act in the tragedy of horror, was before 
emancipation had been proposed. The abolition of slavery, some time after, took 
place quietly, and was followed by years of good order and prosperity. It was the 
perfidious attempt of Napoleon, after all this, to subjugate the island, and re-enslave 
the colored inhabitants, that opened the second scene of the tragedy, which was 
indeed enacted in blood, and drove the surviving whites from the island. The 
danger of slavery, not of freedom, is the only legitimate inference from this history. 

The horrors of the French Revolution, too, in like manner, are to be charged 
mainly upon the corruption in the Church and the despotism in the State, that 
seduced the French philosophers into atheism, and drove the populace to despera- 
tion. And then it was but a counterfeit of true democracy that was introduced, 
and holding no nearer affinity to it than the corrupted Christianity of France had 
held to the Christianity of Christ. In fact, the anarchy that was misnamed liberty, 
was only a reproduction of the old despotisms in another form, trampling all the 
inalienable rights of humanity under foot, and resulting in a settled military despot- 
ism in the end. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 131 

country, was listened to by many without marked disfavor. 
The violent overthrow of a corrupt and oppressive Church in 
France, had involved along with it the open repudiation of 
Christianity and the Bible, and had suggested the idea of 
the overthrow of all churches. Thomas Paine, a leading; 
democratic writer of this country during the Revolution, and 
the intimate friend of Thomas Jefferson,' came home from a 
sojourn in France, deeply imbued with these sentiments, and 
found kindred spirits here, where his infidel writings had pre- 
ceded him. 

In the ranks of this school might be numbered not a few 
of that class of American revolutionists, before noticed, whose 
influence and example, like Paine's,* were not on the side of 
morality and social order, and who could not have contributed, 
had they been thus disposed (as very many of them were not) 
to any healthful or hopeful enterprise for slave emancipation. 
Had any thing been desired or attemptedf in that direction, by 
the party absorbing this class of influences, and coming into 
power with Mr. Jefferson, in 1801, it is not improbable that 
the cry against them, of " infidelity, anarchy, and bloodshed " 
would have been, if possible, redoubled. That the opposite 

* Paine was an advocate of the abolition of slavery, and as clerk of the Pennsyl- 
vania House of Assembly, affixed his signature to the act of prospective 
emancipation in that State. The infidel principles and lax morals of Paine occa- 
sioned much prejudice against his doctrine of the " rights of man." 

t There is no evidence that the Democratic or Republican party, at any period, 
was inclined to abolish slavery. Among all the loud and bitter complaints raised by 
them against the alleged despotic tendencies of the Federal party, its support of 
slavery was never mentioned. And among all the democratic measures proposed 
by Mr. Jefferson while in office, the abolition of slavery was not one. His own 
eloquent writings against slavery could not persuade him to emancipate (as Washing- 
ton had done) his own slaves. The early identification of a majority of leading 
slaveholders with the Democratic party, and the steady control of that party by 
them, ever since, has always been a great puzzle and a great stumbling-block in the 
way of Democratic progress. 

The historical solution seems to be, that Northern talent and Northern capital (the 
natural rivals of Southern talent and capital) had committed themselves against the 
democratic theory. The only way to " get up an issue" was to espouse the theory, 
but blink the particular application to slavery, with the double advantage of neutral- 
izing and disarming the hostile principle. And if democratic measures favored 
labor, the slaveholder adroitly stood in the place of the Southern laborer, and might 
count on the co-operation of the Northern laborer. 



132 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

party, while in power, under Washington and Adams, and 
amid the opposition they encountered, and the jealousies, the 
panic, and the confusion of that singular crisis, should have 
attempted anything so radically democratic and unprecedented 
as the sudden emancipation of all the slaves, most assuredly 
was not to have been expected. We say nothing in excuse 
of the derelictions of either of these parties, nor in peculiar or 
exclusive reproach of either of them, but we think it impor- 
tant to present a true and impartial account of the facts of 
that period, that the causes of our present unhappy position 
may be understood, and avoided in future. A Christianity 
crippled by an alliance with even the most pure and elevated 
description of aristocracy, is incompetent to the task of secur- 
ing human freedom. A democracy, or a philanthropy, how- 
ever ardent and radical, that is not based upon the Christianity 
of the Bible, is equally impotent, for the same sublime mis- 
sion* 

10. Among the influences tending strongly to bribe the pub- 
lic sentiment, and change the political tendencies of the coun- 
try, especially at the South, on the slave question, have been 
justly reckoned the increased and unforeseen profitableness of 
slave labor, in consequence of the invention of the cotton-gin, 
by Mr. Whitney. Of the reasons which had operated to pro- 
duce the conviction, during the revolutionary period, that 
slavery was a waning system that must soon be abandoned, 
the unprofitableness of slave labor was doubtless, in many 
minds, a leading one. This economical view of the subject 
must have become the more prominent as the moral influences 
and the generous enthusiasm of the revolutionary period gave 
place to plans of individual thrift and accumulation. Then it 
was that the blighting influences of slavery must have begun 
to be felt ; but a wonderful change was at hand, the almost 
magical result of a labor-saving machine, in the hands, not of 



* It belongs to a later period of the history of the parties to remark, that the 
rival aristocracies of the North and South, throwing the Federal party and its suc- 
cessors into the embraces of the one, and the Democratic into the hands of the 
other, have effectually prevented the abolition of slavery. 



' SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 133 

the laborer himself, but of the capitalist who controlled him, 
and appropriated the avails of his labor. And thus, at the 
very moment when the more worthy and noble considerations 
in favor of liberty had almost ceased to occupy the slavehold- 
er's attention, the most powerful temptations were presented 
to his cupidity and avarice. Under this temptation, he fell. 
And the policy of the national government was, in conse- 
quence, changed. On this point, we present the testimony of 
two statesmen holding opposite views, in general, of the slave 
question. 

" What, then, have been the causes which have created so new a feeling 
in favor of slavery in the South — which have changed the whole nomen- 
clature of the South on the subject — and from being thought of and de- 
scribed in the terms I have mentioned and will not repeat, it has now 
become an institution, a cherished institution there ; no evil, no scourge, 
but a great religious, social, and moral blessing, as I think I have heard it 
latterly described? I suppose this, sir, is owing to the sudden uprising and 
rapid growth of the cotton plantations of the South. ****** 
The tables will show that the exports of cotton for the years 1790 and 1791 
were hardly more than forty or fifty thousand dollars a year. It has gone 
on increasing rapidly until it may now be, perhaps, in a season of great 
product and high prices, a hundred millions of dollars. Then there was 
more of wax, more of indigo, more of rice, more of almost everything 
exported from the South than of cotton. I think I have heard it said, when 
Mr. Jay negotiated the treaty of 1794 with England, he did not know that 
cotton was exported at all from the United States ; and I have heard it said 
that, after the J^aty which gave to the United States the right to carry 
their own commoditre^to^Jngland in their own ships, the custom-house in 
London refused to aduiv^Hctou, upon an allegation that it could not be an 
American production, there being, as they supposed, no cotton raised in 
America. They would hardly think so now." — Speech of D. Webster, 
U. S. Senate, March 7, 1850. 

" Unhappily, the original policy of the Government and the original prin- 
ciples of the Government in respect to slavery, did not permanently control 
its action. A change occurred — almost imperceptible at first, but becoming 
more and more marked and decided, until nearly total. The Honorable 
Senator from Massachusetts, in the course of his late speech, noticed this 
change, and ascribed it to the rapid increase in the production of cotton. 
Doutless, sir, this was a leading cause. The production of cotton, in con- 
sequence of the invention of the cotton-gin, increased from 487,600 pounds 
in 1793, to 6,276,300 pounds in 1796, and continued to increase very rapidly 



131 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

afterwards. Of course the market value of slaves advanced, and masters 
were less inclined to emancipation. 1 ' — Speech of S. P. Chase, U. S. Senate, 
March 26, 1850. 

When the cotton manufacture of the North came to engross 
so great an amount of northern capital, a bond of affinity be- 
tween northern and southern capitalists was created, which at 
length, has almost indissolubly interwoven the Eastern States 
in the web of the slave power. If anything is to be done to 
disentangle or cut the threads, it must be done soon. 

11. There is yet another cause to be mentioned, that oper- 
ates, perhaps, still more strongly to attach the slaveholders to 
their present system, and bind the North to their car. Except 
to the growers of cotton and those who raise human herds, 
further north, to sell to them, the slave system, even now, is 
not a pecuniary benefit to the slaveholder. Though many indi- 
viduals are enriching themselves by the system, the southern 
country, on the whole, is becoming impoverished by it. But 
there is, at the South, a still more potent passion than the 
love of wealth. It is the lust of political power, and slavery 
has always been an element of political power to the slave- 
holders in the Southern States. Though frequently, if not 
commonly, a minority, in the different States, (counting 
slaves, free colored persons, and non-slavehoiding whites,) the 
slaveholders have always held the political power of the slave 
States in their own hands, and may calculate upon doing this 
while the slave system continues. Since the adoption of the 
Federal Constitution, in 1789, slavery has also become an all- 
controlling element of political power in this nation, in the 
hands of an oligarchy of slaveholders. This element, at first, 
was scarcely perceived. It originated in that provision of the 
Constitution which gives to the South a representation for 
their slaves, in the apportionment of representatives, and in 
the election of President and Vice President of the United 
States. A perception of this advantage has taught the slave- 
holders to regard the slave system as the grand instrument of 
their political ascendency in the nation. It has taught politi- 
cal aspirants at the North to become sycophantic and servile. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 135 

These joint influences, like the upper and nether mill-stone, 
are rapidly grinding to powder the last hopes of American 
freedom, unless the remedy be promptly applied by the reso- 
lute withdrawal of votes from slaveholders and their syco- 
phants. The federal patronage, and the national policy, in 
the hands of slavery, have been found too powerful for the 
remaining energies of freedom. These advantages remaining 
with the slave power, the nation becomes enslaved. 

12. Of all the causes or indications, in that period, of a decline 
of the spirit of liberty, and of a corresponding resuscitation of 
the once waning system of slavery, there was none more com- 
prehensive, more significant, or more influential than the 
changed spirit and position of the Church. 

Not one of the causes or indications Til ready enumerated, 
has failed to affect, most injuriously, the character and the 
influence of the Church, and when the weight of the Church 
itself came to be thrown into the scale of slavery, each one of 
the causes or indications connected with the transition could 
not fail to receive fresh accessions of strength ; and, by being 
combined in the bosom of the Church, consolidating and 
intrenching themselves there, with a compactness and solidity 
unknown before, they have rendered themselves almost im- 
23regnable, ever since. 

In speaking of this transition of the Church, we do not for- 
get that the Church had not, at any period, divorced herself 
wholly from slavery, nor even, as a whole, taken the ground 
of immediate and uncompromising action on the subject. 
The doctrine of "gradual" repentance, resulting, in part, from 
the defective theologies then commonly in vogue, and which 
rejected the idea of sudden moral transformations, was the 
fatal error of the Church, and from her it had been imbibed 
by the best statesmen of the age, nurtured and taught in her 
bosom. 

But we speak of the transition of the Church as we do of 
the corresponding transition of the State. We give both 
bodies the credit of no small degree of earnestness and hon- 
esty, in their opposition to slavery during the revolutionary 



186 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

period, though they failed of applying promptly the appro- 
priate remedy, in its proper form. The transition of which we 
speak was from this state of honest opposition to slavery and 
incipient though dilatory action against it, to a state of 
comparative apathy, first ; of a quiescence, next ; and finally, 
of apology, of biblical defence, and of opposition to all earnest 
endeavors to diffuse information on the subject, and to array 
a public sentiment against slavery. 

When the external pressures, and the special dangers inci- 
dent to the slave system, during the war, were removed from 
the community by the return of peace, they were removed also 
from the Church. The Church, too, as well as the world, for- 
got her solemn resolutions, in the hour of distress, to put away 
this iniquity from her bosom. When philanthropists content- 
ed themselves with mere moral suasion, without demanding 
distinct and effective legislation on the subject, they acted 
upon maxims they had imbibed in the Church ; a Church that 
neglected to preach the religious duty of political justice in 
" delivering the spoiled out of the hands of the oppressor," 
and "executing judgment between a man and his neighbor." 
When projects of gradualism deceived the friends of the op- 
pressed, it was because the Church had taught the doctrines 
of gradualism rather than those of immediate and uncon- 
ditional compliance with all the divine precepts. When the 
moral reformers of those times consented to moral compro- 
mises, they were kept in countenance by the corresponding 
policy of the Church, from which they had received, directly 
or indirectly, their moral education, and of which the greater 
part of them were members. The general decline of pure 
religion and sound morality after the Revolution, is known 
to have affected, very seriously, the Church, and it was the 
testimony and the complaint of her most vigilant watchmen, 
that her standard of morality, and the efficacy of her discipline 
could not be restored to their former state. How evidently 
and how disastrously must such a fact have affected the posi- 
tion of the Church on the slave question ! And how notori- 
ously have these manifestations been increasing ever since! 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 137 

Even revivals of religion have done little towards restoring 
the ancient standard of morals. The moral duties have been 
less insisted on from the pulpit, and the religion revived and 
propagated in times of religious awakening, has been common- 
ly of a corresponding type, till the idea that ministers and 
churches must not meddle with political sins, has grown up 
into theories concerning " organic sins," that would have 
astonished our fathers. 

The general decline of the spirit of liberty that was 
witnessed in the community, was witnessed also in the 
Church, and the same moral lethargy and stupor came over 
them both. The influx of wealth, the erection of castes and 
aristocracies in society, that displaced simplicity and equality 
in the State, produced similar effects in the Church. 
Especially was it true that the more elevated aristocracy of 
intelligence, of character, and of spiritual pride, that led 
prominent statesmen to distrust their fellow-citizens in the 
exercise of their God-given rights, found its home and its 
sanctuary in the high places of the Church and the ministry, 
by whom the policy of those statesmen was most earnestly 
and effectively sustained. By these, in an especial manner, 
were the horrors of the French Revolution so exhibited as to 
teach the danger of according to human beings, as such, the 
exercise of essential human rights. However honest may 
have been the error, and however plausibly maintained, it was 
none the less to be deplored. The unexpected profitableness 
of slave labor in the production of cotton was a temptation to 
the Church, as well as to the rest of the community, and with 
the rest of the community the Southern Church fell into the 
snare. And the profitableness of the cotton manufacture at 
the North, and the consequent sympathy of the manufacturer 
with the planter, has influenced the Northern Church, not ex- 
cepting the Society of Friends, as really (if not as universally) 
as it has the rest of the community. The same may be 
said of the temptations of ambition, connected with this 
anomalous element of political power, and among our most 



138 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

supple and obsequious politicians, are honored and even 
devout members of the Church. 

So that all the elements and causes of declension, in respect 
to the treatment of slavery, that have appeared and operated 
in the* body politic, have appeared and operated likewise in 
the Church. There they have become concentrated, there they 
have been strengthened, there, above all, they have been 
baptized "into the name of the Father, and of the Son, and 
of the Holy Ghost" — have been seated at the communion 
table, have been elevated into the pulpit, have been installed 
trustees and professors of Colleges and Theological Seminaries ; 
have been made managers and life members of Bible, Tract, 
and Missionary Societies, have shaped the course of ecclesi- 
astical bodies, and revised and controlled the discipline of the 
Church. 

Besides all this, the Church has seemed to embody elements 
of deterioration peculiarly her own. Her divisions into rival 
sects and theological schools have ensnared her ; she has 
compromised her christian principles, has neutralized, or with- 
drawn her testimony, and has faltered in her administration 
of discipline, to gain strength and numbers wherewith to carry 
on schismatic and polemic wars within her own bosom ! 
I When the Methodist testimonies against slavery were found 
to stand in the way of the comparative growth and prospective 
ascendency of the Methodist sect, then the severity of 
Methodist discipline against slavery must be relaxed (so we 
have been told by the apologists of that policy) to propitiate 
the favor of slaveholders. In the same way, and for the same 
object, the testimonies of the Presbyterian sect against slavery 
must be rendered a dead letter, and the most pointed of them 
at length, expunged. The unity and extension of the sect, 
and the harmony of its ecclesiastical action throughout the 
country, must not be disturbed by any agitation of the exci- 
ting question. The cry of " peace, peace," must drown the 
voice of remonstrance against the crying sin of the Church. 
And thus the Church becomes a privileged body, the mem- 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 139 

bers of which appear to claim peculiar exemption from 
reproof for their sins. 

13. There is still another and a most potent element and 
evidence of deterioration, on this subject, that we know not 
how to treat of, as its magnitude and its meanness demand. 
"Whenever we attempt to speak or write upon it, we feel our 
cheeks burning with indignation and shame. We know not 
how or in what terms to describe it, to what origin to trace it, 
or by what considerations to attempt to dislodge it from the 
minds of sane men. From its flat contradiction of the Bible, 
we should characterize it as decidedly of infidel parentage, yet 
we find it nestling in the bosom of the Church. From its 
unaccountableness, we should describe it by the names of 
hypocrisy and pretence, did not its malignity prove its 
sincerity and realit}^. "Were it less murderous and less 
blasphemous, we might laugh at it; were it less ludicrous, we 
might reason against it; were it less mean, we could enter 
the lists against it, as an object of honorable warfare. We 
should attribute it to sheer vulgarity and ignorance (where 
we find it signally at home) but that we meet with it also in 
circles claiming refinement and learning. We allude to the 
infatuation that virtually predicates humanity upon the hue 
of the skin, that disbelieves that "God had made of one blood 
all nations of men," that arrogates to less than one-sixth part 
of the human race the exclusive monopoly of our common 
humanity, that thus falsifies the self-evident truths of our 
Declaration of Independence, and sets up, in the temples of 
Jehovah, the monuments of heathen caste. 

Existing in and controlling both the community and the 
Church, this prejudice should have been noticed earlier in our 
enumeration of evil influences, but it seems not to have 
attained its gigantic growth till the united energies of a lapsed 
Church and State had first provided for it, new methods of 
culture. W r e do not say that the Colonization Society 
organized in 1816, created this prejudice, for without such a 
prejudice the idea of colonizing a portion of our citizens on 
the ground of their color could not have been conceived. 



140 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

But we do say that the existence and operations of that 
Society, have more than quadrupled the strength and the 
extent of that prejudice, in a few brief years. It is a prejudice 
stronger at the North than at the South, because the two 
colors do not come so constantly in contact. Yet, at the 
North, it had scarcely made its appearance in common schools 
and worshiping assemblies, at the beginning of the present 
century, as many can testify. 

The Maryland laws, before quoted, forbidding white women 
to marry negroes, simply for the reason stated, that the latter 
were slaves, afford sufficient proof of the modern date of this 
prejudice, and of its origin in the slave system. 

In countries not familiarized with a population of colored 
slaves, (as in Eussia and Poland, where the serfs are all 
whites,) the prejudice against colored people is unknown, and 
its existence among us is there discredited, or considered an 
inexplicable phenomenon. In France, in England, in Ger- 
many, and throughout all Europe, though the Jews are a 
degraded caste, the educated negro has free access, and on 
terms of unquestioned equality, to the very highest circles of 
society. It is reserved to a nation pluming itself upon being 
the world's teacher of the doctrine of human equality, to deny 
the common courtesies of Hie, along with the. essential rights 
of humanity, to a large part of the human species, (to the very 
race first proficient in literature and civilization,) on account 
of their color! Thus do we invite and merit a world's scorn ! 

Were it not for this stupid prejudice against color, the 
sceptre of the slaveholding oligarchy would drop powerless 
at once, and the nation would be disenthralled. Sustained by 
this debasing prejudice, its supremacy must remain unbroken, 
and the nation must be enslaved. Slaverij knows no color. — 
"In the progress of time, some one hundred and fifty or two 
hundred years hence, but few vestiges of the black race will 
remain among our posterity." So says Henry Clay,* and the 

* Speech of Henry Clay, in the U. S. Senate, in 1839. In this speech Mr. Clay 
ur^ed arguments against " emancipation, immediate or gradual." " The first imped- 
iment, is the absolute want of power in the Federal Government to effect the 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 141 

constant and rapid blending of colors at the South jus: 
the estimate. But the bleaching process removes not the taint 
of slavery. The child of the slave mother follows her condi- 
tion. Persons of the whitest complexion are already held as 



purpose." " The next obstacle in the way of abolition arises out of the fact of the 
presence, in the Slave States, of three millions of slaves. No practical scheme for 
their removal or separation from us, has yet been devised or proposed." [The 
Colonization scheme, then, is not "practical."] "The third impediment to imme- 
diate abolition, is to he found in the immense amount of capital which is invested in 
slave property." " The total value of slave property then, by estimate, in the United 
States, is twelve hundred millions of dollars. And now it is rashly proposed, by a 
single fiat of legislation, to annihilate this immense amount of property ! To anni- 
hilate it without indemnity, and without compensation to the owners." "I know 
there is^i visionary dogma which holds that negro slaves cannot be the subject of 
property: I shall not dwell long on the speculative abstraction. That is property 
which the law declares to be property. Two hundred years of legislation have sanc- 
tified and sanctioned negro slaves as property." " It is frequently asked, What is 
to become of the African race among us ? Are tbey forever to remain in bondage ?'.' 
' "Taking the aggregate of the two races, the European is constantly, 
though slowly, gaining on the African portion. In the progress of time, some one 
hundred and fifty or two hundred years hence, but few vestiges of the black race 
will remain among our posterity." 

The speech will repay close study. In no part of it does Mr. Clay intimate a 
future abolition of slavery. The " impediments" lie urges will not diminish. The 
limited powers of the Federal Government — the sanction of centuries of legislation 
— the impossibility of separation or removal — the appalling amount of property 
invested — all these, except the first item, must increase. Neither does Mr. Clay pre- 
dict the future extinction of slavery, but only the disappearance of the "olack race 
from among oxjk posterity /" The language is exceedingly guarded, and commend- 
ably accurate. Mr. Clay knows that the slave population, like the free, arc increasing 
in a geometrical ratio. And that, if it be true that the free (or as he has it, the 
European portion) are gaining a little more rapidly, this does not alter, the fact of the 
rapid increase of slaves, whatever their color may be. Indisputably it is the process 
of amalgamation, and nothing else, that lays the foundation for the estimate that one 
hundred and fifty or two hundred years will " leave but few vestiges of the black 
race Asioxoour posterity !" Neither the "slaves" nor the "blacks" are diminishing 
by depopulation, like the Indians and the Sandwich Islanders. The reverse is the 
known fact. Mr. Clay's remedy for the "bondage of the African race" is mani- 
festly a future enslavement of a vastly greater number of" our posterity," " A MOX< i" 
whom will remain "but few vestiges of the black race in one hundred and fifty or 
two hundred years." 

Gov. MeDuffie, of South Carolina, had declared a laboring community, " bleached 
or unbleached," "a dangerous element in the body politic." He had antiei 
their enslavement, in the Northern States, in "less than a quarter of a century." 
To Mr. Clay it was reserved to intimate a respite of one hundred and fifty or two 
hundred years, showing how it must then be inevitably introduced, by causes 
already in operation, and fortified by formidable " obstacles" and " impediments" in 



142 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

slaves — fugitives are thus described in advertisements, hunted, 
captured at the North, and taken back again. And it is 
known that, in some cases, white persons have been kidnapped 
who had no African blood in their veins. 

To this point, then, at length, our declension has reached. 
'We hesitate to give up the insane prejudice that supports 
slavery, though told never so plainly, and from the best 
authority, that the consequence must be the loss of our own 
liberties — the enslavement of our own children ! Nay, while 
we hear it proclaimed from the loftiest battlements of slave- 
dom, that " the noblest blood of Virginia," the noblest blood 
of our revolutionary sires, runs in the veins of slaves.* 

the way of their removal. Those "obstacles" and "impediments" present the 
problem for the laboring people of the free States. Unless overcome, the prophecy 
of Mr. Clay must become history. There is no possible or conceivable alternative. 
Let the people banish prejvflice against cohr, and all Mr. Clay's "impediments" and 
" obstacles" would vanish in twenty-four hours. 

( * It has been credibly reported, over the signatures of respectable citizens, that a 
reputed daughter of Thomas Jefferson has been seen exposed for sale at auction in 
New Orleans, as a slave. The known usages of slavery in America are such as to 
render the statement a highly probable one. It is also said that a grand-daughter of 
Mr. Jefferson is among the colonists of Liberia. The statement, along with the fol- 
lowing, is from a communication in " Frederick Douglass' paper" for March 25, 1852 : 
" I have heard from an eye witness, that on more than one occasion, when the sage 
of*Monticello left that retreat for the Presidential abode at "Washington, there would 
be on the top of the same coach a yelkm boy ' running away.' And when told 
chat one of his slaves was going off without leave, Jefferson said, ' Well, let him go, 
his right is as good as his father's P And, somehow, that boy would get a doceur 
before the ' parting of the ways.' " ) 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 143 



CHAPTER XII. 

POSITION OF THE AMERICAN CHURCHES RESPECTING SLAVERY 
DURING THE FIRST HALF OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY. 

I. — METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH. 

General Conference of 1S01 — do. of 1836 — Contrast with 1797 — Leading Ministers — 
Prof. E. D. Sims— Dr. S. Olin— Pres. Thornton— Bishop Soule— Dr. Bond— Pres. 
Fiske — Bishop Hedding — Refusal to put to vote Anti-Slavery Resolutions in Con- 
ference — Georgia Annual Conference — S. Carolina Conference — " Book Concern " 
— General Conference for 1810 — Division concerning slaveholding Bishops — 
Grounds of the division — Slaveholding statistics of M. E. Church, North. 

In speaking of the position of the churches, we shall have 
reference to the general fact — the principal religious denomi- 
nations — the leading influences — not forgetting that there are 
honorable exceptions to the picture we shall be compelled to 
present. 

The former anti-slavery testimonies of the Society of 
Friends, and also of the Presbyterian and Methodist, and 
some of the Baptist churches, until near the close of the last 
century, we have presented already.* Of other denomina- 
tions, as such, at that period, we had nothing of an authentic 
character to record. We are assured that there were earnest 
opposers of slavery among Episcopalians, and other religious 
communions. 

Of the course of the principal denominations since that time, 
and their position at present, we propose now to treat; in doing 
which, such facts will be brought forward as will enable the 
reader to form his own judgment in the premises. 

* See Chapters IV. and IX. 



144 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 



METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH. 

In reverting to the action of the Methodist Conferences, 
towards the close of the last century (Chap. IX.), the reader 
would almost be warranted to take it for granted that slave- 
holding, in that religious denomination, must have speedily 
come to an end. There can be no doubt that such was the 
intention of the Conferences, and that such was the general 
expectation at the time. Such, however, was not the fact. 
The fatal error seems to have consisted in an unwarrantable 
lenity towards delinquent members, in not promptly enforcing 
the discipline, and this under the delusive expectation that 
they would, in a short time, be prepared to take the step, 
voluntarily, themselves, without being authoritatively coerced. 
Never, perhaps, was there a more striking illustration of the 
danger of such delays. The church that, with a full and clear 
perception of the iniquity of a practice existing among its 
members, has not fidelity and energy to expel it at once, has 
no reason to flatter itself that it ever will. If the Friends 
were more successful, notwithstanding their tardy process, the 
reason may perhaps be found in the fact, that they did not so 
directly sin against their own conscientious convictions, in 
withholding chnrch discipline. They were first led to con- 
demn what appeared to be the abuses of slavery, then the 
slave trade, and at last, slaveholding itself. And so far as their 
convictions went, they put them in practice. ButrMethodism, 
which had its rise amid the testimonies and the-conviction 
that "slavery is the sum of all viUanies" could not sit down 
with that iniquity m ner skirts without being overcome by it. 

In 1801, the General Conference said — 

" We are more than ever convinced of the great evil of African Slavery, 
which still exists in these United States." 

And there the testimony still stands. "More than ever 
convinced of the great evil," and "more than ever" wedded 
to it and embedded in it. Such testimonies, though some- 
times apparently relied upon, to disprove the pro-slavery 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 145 

character of the Church, contain the strongest proof of the 
inexcusableness of its position. The Church knows the evil, 
but nevertheless hugs it to her bosom. 

Yet there should be noticed here, perhaps, a studied dilution 
of the testimony previously given. In 1780, slavery was 
admitted to be " contrary to the laws of God, man, and nature, 
and hurtful to Society, contrary to the dictates of conscience 
and true religion, and doing what we would not that others 
should do unto us." This clearly describes it as a sin. But 
in 1801 it is only designated, in vague terms, as an evil; 
whether physical or moral, is not expressed. J)To those who 
would understand the course and the position of our ecclesi- 
astical bodies, these nice distinctions should be noticed with 
care. "Fraud lurkcth in generalities," said Lord Coke. 

" Rev. Robert Emory, in his history of ' The Discipline,' informs us that 
he finds the following : — 

"In 1789, ' The buying and selling the bodies and souls of men, women, 
or children, with intention to enslave them.' 

"In 179-2, it reads 'The buying or selling of men, women, or children, 
with an intention to enslave them.' 

"In 1808, it reads 'The buying and selling of men, women, and 
children,' &c. 

" For this alteration no authority is found in the Journal of the General 
Conference." — " The Grounds of Secession, from the M. E. Church" — By 
O. Scott, p. 45. 

"And the following, from a letter published in the Pittsburg Christian 
Advocate, by Rev. Mr. Drummond, is not less important : 

"If we take the action of the General Conference as a true index of anti- 
slavery feeling and zeal in the Church, I think it apparent that these have 
been considerably diminished, since 1800." — lb. pp. 45-46. 

"In 1804, the paragraphs about considering the subject, and petitions to 
the legislatures (viz : No. 4, of 1796, and No. 6, of 1800) were stricken 
out." 

1808 — Paragraph 2 and 3 of 1796 were struck out, and the following 
substituted : 

"3. The General Conference authorizes each Annual Conference to form 
their own regulations, relative to buying and selling slaves." — lb. p. 47. 

VjThe General Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, 
held at Cincinnati, in 1836, declared that they " wholly disclaim 
any right, wish, or intention, to interfere with the civil and 

10 



146 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

political relation of master and slave, as it exists in the slave- 
holding States of this Union." This was adopted by a vote 
of 120 to 14. 

The action of the Conference, at the same time against 
abolitionists, will be noticed in another chapter. What we have 
to do with, now, is the changed attitude of the Methodist 
Episcopal Church, respecting slavery. We quote their proceed- 
ings still farther on this point. In their Pastoral Address, 
dissuading their members from agitating the subject, they 
say— 

" The question of slavery in the United States, by the constitutional 
compact which binds us together, as a nation, is left to be regulated by the 
several State Legislatures themselves ; and thereby is put beyond the 
control of the general government, as well as of all ecclesiastical bodies ; it 
being manifest that in the slaveholding states themselves the entire 
responsibility of its existence or non-existence rests with those State 
T/egislatures." n. 

What " Constitutional Compact" had there been made 
since 1797, when the General Conference, as before shown,* 
had required its preachers to memorialize the legislatures ? 
And if, as stated in 1836, the sole responsibility rested on the 
State Legislatures, why not continue to memorialize them 
still? There must have been Methodists in those legislatures, 
and probably few or no members of those bodies held seats 
there without the aid of Methodist votes ? Aside from this, 
how could any state or national arrangements relieve the 
Church from the responsibility of carrying out its own Church 
discipline? The truth was expressed in the Resolution just 
now quoted. The Conference had " no wish" " to interfere 
in the civil and political relation of master and slave." Too 
many of them were slavemasters themselves. 

Another important thing to be noticed here, is, the new 
views of the M. E. Conference, since 1797 or 1801 and 1836, 
on the subject of the bearings of the Federal Constitution on 
the question. It indicates a corresponding change in the 
community in general. New expositions and applications of 

* Chap. IX. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 147 

constitutional law must have grown up, or wc should not 
witness such a change of language. 

Leading non-slaveholding ministers of the M. E. Church, 
uvre now forward to take similar ground, and even to vindi- 
cate the rightfulness of slaveholding. 

" Having established the point, that the first African slaves were legally 
brought into bondage, the right to detain their children in bondage, follows 
as an indispensable consequence. Thus we see that the slavery which 
exists in America, was founded in right." — Professor E. D. Simms of 
Virginia Conference. 

" Not only is holding slaves, on the conditions and under the restrictions 
of the discipline, no disqualification for the ministerial office ; but I will go a 
little further, and say, that slaveholding is not constitutionally a forfeiture of 
a man's right, if he may be said to have one, to the office of a bishop." — Dr. 
S. Olin, Prcs. of the Wcsleyan University, Middlctown, (Ct.) 

" That God not only permitted it, but absolutely provided for its perpe- 
tuity. The act of holding a slave then, under all circumstances, God being 
judge, is not sin." — Pres. S. C. Thornton, Centenary College, Miss. 
Conference. 

' ; I have never yet advised the liberation of a slave, and think I never 
shall." — Bishop Souleat the Pittsburg Conference, Washington, Pa., July, 
1839. 

" The buying of a slave may be an act of great humanity under certain 
circumstances, as well as the holding of those already in possession. And, 
moreover, we should be as much opposed to the introduction of a rule of 
discipline, to expel from our communion all who bought a slave, whatever 
the motives might be, as we are to a rule to expel all slaveholders under all 
circumstances." — Dr. Bond of N. Y., to R. Boyd, 1840. 

The late Wilbur Fisk, D. D., President of the Wesleyan 
University, Middletown, Conn., said : 

" The relation of master and slave may, and does, in many cases, exist 
under such circumstances as free the master from the just charge and guilt 
of immorality." 

" The general rule of Christianity not only permits, but in supposable 
cases enjoins, a continuance of the master's authority." 

u The New Testament enjoins obedience upon the slave, as an obligation 
due to a present rightful authority." 

" Rev. Elijah Hedding, D. D., one of the six Methodist 
Bishops," and also a northern man, said: 

" The right to hold a slave is founded on this rule : ' Therefore, all things 



148 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them ; 
for this is the law and the prophets.'" — Ch. Adv. and Jour., Oct. 20, 1837. 

Bishop Hedding, presiding at the New England Conference, 
in 1838, refused to put resolutions, condemning the buying 
and selling of slaves, and at the same time refused to put a 
motion declaring slavery to be a moral evil. 

" In the year 1837, the Baltimore Conference passed the following reso- 
lution : 

" That in all cases of administration under the General Rule in reference 
to buying and selling men, women, and children, &c, it be, and hereby is 
recommended to all committees, as the sense of this Conference, that the 
said rule be taken, construed, and understood so as not to make the guilt or 
innocence of the accused to depend upon the simple fact of purchase or 
sale, but upon the attendant circumstances of cruelty, injustice, or inhu- 
manity on the one hand, or those of kind purposes or good intentions on the 
other, under which the actions shall have been perpetrated ; and further it 
is recommended, that, in all such cases, the charge be brought for immor- 
ality, and the circumstances be adduced as specifications under that charge.' " 
The Grounds of Secession, &c, pp. 53-4. 

" The General Conference of 1840 approved of the journals of the Bal- 
timore Conference, with this resolution in them — approved of them, this 
resolution and all ; consequently, approved of it, and made it their own." — Jb. 

For a full account the reader is referred to the work just 
quoted, and also to Lucius C. Matlack's " History of Ameri- 
can Slavery and Methodism," from 1780 to 1849, an elaborate 
and documentary work of nearly 400 pages. 

The Georgia Annual Conference unanimously resolved, " that slavery, as 
it exists in the United States, is not a moral evil." 

The South Carolina Conference unanimously adopted the following : 
" Whereas, we hold that the subject of slavery in these United States is 
not one proper for the action of the Church, but is exclusively appropriate 
to the civil authorities, therefore, resolved, that this Conference will not 
meddle with it, farther than to express the regret that it has ever been 
introduced, in any form, into any of the judicatures of the Church." 

"Rev. W. Capers, D.D.," who offered this resolution, explained it as 
" implying that slavery is not a moral evil. He understood it as equivalent 
to such a declaration. His purpose was that of not only reproving some 
wrong doings at the North, but with respect also to the General Confer- 
ence," &c. " If slavery were a moral evil — that is, sin — the Church would 
be bound to take cognizance of it." — [January, 1839.] 



BLAVERT AND FREEDOM. 149 

" The Rook Concern, in New York, up to the division which followed 
the General Conference of 1811, published books for the whole connection, 
North and South ; hence, in the republication of English works which have 
contained allusions to slavery, various expedients were resorted to, to ren- 
der them acceptable to slaveholders. Sometimes the anti-slavery matter is 
said to have been expunged, and in other cases it has been attempted to 
explain it away by notes appended by the American Book-room editor." — 
True Wesleyan, Jan. 24, 1852. 

The Editor of the True Wesleyan, proceeds to specify an 
instance of the latter. In re-publishing Watson's Theological 
Institutes, in which were found some pointed remarks against 
slaveholders, a note is appended, evidently designed to make 
the impression that it is not applicable to American slavery. 

The General Conference for 18-10 adopted the following : 

" Resolved, that it is inexpedient and unjustifiable for any preacher to 
permit colored persons to give testimony against white persons, in any State 
where they are denied that privilege by law." 

A motion was made to re-consider this Resolution, and 
several attempts were made at compromise, but after a long 
discussion, the resolution was permitted to stand. Thus was 
the ecclesiastical polity of the Church conformed to the slave 
code. 

Some time after the " Wesleyan" secession from the M. E. 
Church on account of slavery, a division took place in the 
Methodist Episcopal Church, growing out of the refusal of the 
Church to consent to having slaveholding bishops. Of this 
division we present the following account from the True 
Weslej'an (a paper of the Wesleyan Secession,) then edited by 
by Rev. Luther Lee, as copied into the Annual Report of the 
Am. and For. A. S. Society, for 1850 : 

" The action of the General Conference which led to the separation, was 
not against slavery or slaveholding by the membership or ministers, but 
simply against slaveholding by the Episcopacy, and that not upon principle, 
but wholly upon the ground of expediency. This division was brought 
about by the Southern and not by the Northern members, who did what 
they could to prevent it, and now condemn the act as unjustifiable ; but it 
did not throw all the slave States into the Southern General Conference. 
Official documents show that there are, at the present time, in the Northern 



150 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

General Conference, eight annual Conferences, a part or the whole of whose 
territory is in the slaveholding States. There are many slaveholding 
preachers in the M. E. Church, and it ordains slaveholders to the ministry. 
It is computed that there are in the M. E. Church, North, not less than four 
thousand slaveholders, and twenty-seven thousand slaves."* 

It would be difficult to reconcile with these facts the strong anti-slavery 
resolutions of the General Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church 
North, in 1849 and in 1850, denouncing slavery in severe terms, repudiating 
" the low standard of morality that sanctions the settlement of any difficul- 
ties by a compromise of moral principles," and concluding the whole by the 
following : 

" Resolved, that Christians cannot consistently give their influence to 
elevate men to places of honor and trust who are known to be supporters 
of any great social and moral evil. 

" Resolved, that the glory of God and the good of mankind require the 
exclusion of slaveholders from the Christian Church." — Annual Report 
American and Foreign Anli- Slavery Society, 1850. 

This progress, (if it be progress) as well as the inconsistencies 
connected with it, may perhaps be accounted for, by the move- 
ments among Northern Methodist Abolitionists, resulting in a 
secession, and in the organization of a new ecclesiastical 
connection, called the Wesleyan Church. These movements 
made it necessary to oppose the election of a slaveholding 
bishop, and to adopt strong resolutions against slavery. 

* The following statement apparently varies from the preceding, in respect to the 
number of slaveholding Conferences : 

" The Methodist Church North has about one-fifth part as many slaveholding 
societies as the entire Church South. It reports in the slave States three annual 
conferences, 857 preachers, and 86,627 members, all in actual and full fellowship 
with slaveholding." — Pres. Blanchard, as reported by Cleveland True Democrat, Sep. 
26, 1851. 

The solution, as furnished us by Mr. Lee, is, ihatfive of the Conferences, viz., the 
Pittsburg, the Ohio, the Indiana, the Illinois, and the Philadelphia, though bearing 
Northern names, include portions of slave territory ; while the Western Virginia, 
the Missouri, and the Baltimore, are slaveholding, of course : eighfin all. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 151 



CHAPTER XIII. 

POSITION OF THE AMERICAN CHURCHES, ETC. CONTINUED. 
II. — THE PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH. 

General Assembly, 1815— 1816— 1818— Erasure of anti-slavery testimony of 1794— 
Synod of Kentucky, 1834— Anti-slavery testimony and pro-slavery practice- 
General Assembly, 1835—" Doctors of Divinity" engaged in the traffic— 1836— 
Pro-slavery pamphlet from Princeton — Discussion — Indefinite postponement- 
General Assembly of 1837 — Anti-slavery memorials laid on the table — Excision of 
four Northern Synods — Division of General Assembly in l^as — And the reason — 
"Old-School" Assembly declined discussing Slavery — In 1843, laid Anti-slavery 
memorials on the table without reading — In 1S45, declared that " to treat slavery 
as necessarily a sin, would be to dissolve itself" — In 1847, re-affirmed its former 
testimonies — In 1850, declared the " interference" of the General Association of 
Massachusetts on the subject " offensive" — New-School General Assembly, 
1833, Anti-slavery memorials withdrawn — In 1S89, " referred the whole subject to 
the Presbyteries" — In 184£>, "indefinitely postponed" — "Vesuvius capped for 
three years"— In 1S43, censured Presbyteries that had excluded slaveholders — 
In 1846, declared Slavery unrighteous, but could not exclude slaveholders — In 
1S49, was ignorant of any blame resting on its slavcholding members — In 1850, 
refused to call slavcholding " an offence under the discipline" — " Deplored the 
workings of the whole system" — Again " referred it to the Presbyteries" — And 
invited the " Old-School" Assembly to commune with them. 

/Notwithstanding the testimony of the Presbyterian Church, 
in 1794, that it is "man-stealing" to "keep, sell, or buy 
slaves," or "retain men in slavery," yet the Church contented 
itself with recording its doctrine without reducing it to prac- 
tice. No discipline was enforced, and the custom of slave- 
holding, among its members and even among the officers of 
the Church, became general, in the slave states. 

In 1815, the General Assembly declared their "approbation of the prin- 
ciples of civil liberty," and their " deep concern at any vestiges of slavery 
which may remain in our country." This is theory. In practice, they 
urge the lower judicatures to prepare the young slaves " for the exercise of 
liberty when God, in his providence, shall open a door for emancipation." 



152 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

" This recommendation is an implied permission to their slaveholding mem- 
bers to dismiss all thoughts of emancipation at present, waiting for some 
colonization opening, or some undefined providence of God." — Statement 
of Pres. Blanchard and others, mi letter to Chr. A. S. Convention in Cin- 
cinnati. 

In 1816, the General Assembly, while it called slavery a " mournful 
evil," directed an erasure of the note (of 1794) to the eighth command- 
ment. 

" In 1818, it adopted an ' expression of views' in which slavery is called 
a ' gross violation of the most precious and sacred rights of human nature, 
utterly inconsistent with the law of God, which requires us to love our 
neighbor as ourselves, and totally irreconcilable with the spirit and prin- 
ciples of the gospel of Christ, which enjoin that ' all things whatsoever ye 
would that men should do to you, do ye also to them.' But, instead of 
requiring the instant abandonment of this ' gross violation of rights,' &c, 
the Assembly exhorts the violators to ' continue and increase their exertions 
to effect a total abolition of slavery, with no greater delay than a regard to 
the public welfare demands,' and recommends, that if ' a Christian professor 
shall sell a slave, who is also in communion with our Church,' without the 
consent of the slave, the seller should ' be suspended till he should repent 
and make reparation.'"* 

The effect of this temporizing and procrastinating policy 
was precisely such as might have been anticipated. The 
"mournful evil" only struck its roots deeper under such 
pruning. 

In 1834, the Synod of Kentucky adopted a report on 
slavery, in which they draw a thrilling picture of the cruelties 
and horrors of the internal slave trade, in which families are 
forcibly separated from each other. They say : 

" These acts are daily occurring in the midst of us." " There is not a 
village or road that does not behold the sad procession of manacled outcasts, 
whose chains and mournful countenances tell that they are exiled by force 
from all that their hearts hold dear. Our church, years ago, raised its voice 
of solemn warning against this flagrant violation of every principle of mercy, 
justice, and humanity. Yet we blush to announce to you, that this warning 
has been often disregarded, even by those who hold to our communion. 
Cases have occurred in our own denomination where professors of the reli- 



* Vide Amer. Churches, &c, by J. G. Birney, to whose statement we have added 
a further extract from the Expression of Views, as republished by the General As- 
sembly in 1846. (Ch. In., April, 184(5.) 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 153 

gion of mercy have torn the mother FROM the children, and sent her 
into a merciless and returnless exile. Yet acts of discipline have 
rarely [never!*] followed such conduct." 

But, who would have believed it? — the Synod of Ken- 
tucky were not, and are not, in favor of present emancipation 
on the soil. With a knowledge of the " incontestible fact " 
(as Henry Clay calls it), that the internal slave trade is insep- 
arable from slavery, and equally aware, as they must be, that 
no removal of the slaves could be effected in a century, the 
Synod of Kentucky, and its leading members, who tell us this 
sad story, are unwilling to listen to any proposal for emancipa- 
tion, without the colonization of the slaves. And the one only 
Presbyterian minister within their bounds who advocated 
immediate and unconditional emancipation on the soil, was 
given to understand by his Presbytery, that he could not con- 
sistently remain with them.f The Synod has fresh cause to 
" blush" — but it will need something besides blushes to purge 
out the plague spot. To " confess" avails little, unless they 
"firsake." 

In 1835, Mr. Stewart, of Illinois, a ruling elder, in advo- 
cating sundry anti-slavery memorials, urged the General 
Assembly to take action on the subject. He said : 

"In this church, a man may take a free-born child, force it away from 
its parents, to whom God gave it in charge, saying, ' Bring it up for me,' 
and sell it as a beast, or hold it in perpetual bondage, and not only escape 
corporal punishment, but really be esteemed an excellent Christian. Nay, 
even ministers of the Gospel, and Doctors of Divinity, may engage in this 
unholy traffic, and yet sustain their high and holy calling." — " Elders, min- 
isters, and Doctors of Divinity, are, with both hands, engaged in the prac- 
tice." 

The facts were not disputed ; yet nothing was done to cen- 
sure the act or the actors, further than to appoint a committee, 
a majority of whom were known to be opposed to the prayer 
of the memorialists (of which the late Dr. Samuel Miller, 



* J. G. Birney, long resident in Kentucky, says " never." 
t J. G. Fee. — The intimation was heeded. 



154 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

Professor at Princeton, was chairman), to report at the next 
session. 

In 1836, this report was presented at Pittsburg. In a pre- 
amble, it is said that " the subject of slavery is inseparably 
connected with the laws of many of the States of this Union, 
with which it is by no means proper for an ecclesiastical body to 
interfere* and that " any action on the part of this Assembly, 
&c, would tend to distract and divide our churches," &c. 
Resolutions were therefore recommended declaring; it " inex- 
pedient for the Assembly to take any further order in relation 
to this subject ;" also affirming that the note on the eighth 
commandment, in 1794, was " introduced irregularly — never 
had the sanction of the church, and therefore never possessed 
any authority," &c. 

A minority of the committee, Messrs. Dickey and Beman, 
presented a report, declaring " the buying, selling, or holding 
a human being as property" "a heinous sin," that " ought to 
subject the doer of it to the censures of the church," &c, &c. ; 
whereupon forty-eight slaveholding delegates met apart, and 
resolved that if any such action was taken by the Assembly 
thejr would not submit to the decision. They also, at an 
adjourned meeting, prepared a substitute for Dr. Miller's reso- 
lution, declaring that " the General Assembly have no author- 
ity to assume or exercise jurisdiction in regard to the existence 
of slavery." 

The subject was finally disposed of by a long preamble and 
a brief resolution, that " this whole subject be indefinitely 
postponed." 

In the meantime, while the Assembly were in session, a 
pamphlet, being a reprint of an article in the Princeton Reper- 
tory, was issued from the Pittsburg press, labelled, " for gra- 
tuitous circulation " among the members of the Assembly. It 
is said to have been written by Prof. Hodge, of Princeton, 



* Yet the funds of the Presbyterian Church, at this moment, to the amount of 
more than $94,000, were invested in the South-Western banks, in prospect of gain- 
ing more than 8 per cent, interest, on account of the unprecedented briskness of the 
domestic slave trade. For the sequel see a succeeding Chapter. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 155 

and is regarded at the South as the strongest Bible argument 
for slavery. It contained the following : 

"At the time of the advent of Jesus Christ, slavery in its worst forms 
prevailed over the world. The Savior found it around him in Judea, the 
apostles met with it in Asia, Greece, and Italy. How did they treat it? 
Not by the denunciation of slaveholding as necessarily sinful. The 
assumption that slaveholding is, in itself, a crime, is not only an error, but 
it is an error fraught with evil consequences." 

In 1837, many anti-slavery memorials were presented to the 
Assembly. They were referred to a committee, of which Dr. 
Witherspoon, a slaveholder, of South Carolina, was chairman, 
and which reported, near the time for adjournment, that the 
memorials be " returned to the house," and the chairman 
moved to lay the whole subject on the table. This was done 
by a vote of 97 to 28. 

At this same session the General Assembly excinded four 
northern Synods, called New School, containing a Presby- 
terian population of about sixty thousand persons. This was 
done ostensibly on account of theological differences, but it is 
remarkable that it cut off a very large proportion of the active 
opponents of slavery in the communion of the Presbyterian 
Church. Dr. G. A. Baxter, President of the Union Theolo- 
gical Seminary, Prince Edward Co., Ya., changed sides sud- 
denly from New School to Old, about the same time, and 
justified the change by avowing that '' one motive " was the 
firm position of the Old School against abolition. And since 
the separation, in 1838, some anti-abolition clergyman, onco 
known as New School, within the bounds of the excinded 
Synods, in the State of New York, have transferred theii 
relations to the Old School. 

OLD SCHOOL GENERAL ASSEMBLY. 
" In 1838, the two Schools separated,* leaving three slaveholding Presby- 

* The separation in 1838 is understood to have been for the same cause as tin 
excision of 1837. 

According to a correspondent of the New York Observer, Dr. Gardiner Spring, of 
New York, at a Colonization Meeting in "Washington City, in 1339, held the follow- 
ing language : 



156 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

teries represented in the New, and between thirty and forty in the Old." — 
" Since that time the Old School has abode firmly on the Princeton ground." 

In 1838, the 0. S. General Assembly resolved that "it is 
of the greatest consequence to the best interests of our church, 
that the subject of slavery shall not be discussed in the ensu- 
ing General Assembly," &c. 

In 1843, they laid anti-slavery memorials on the table with- 
out reading. 

In 1845, after an hour's discussion, at Cincinnati, they 
adopted a report that they could not treat slavery as necessa- 
rily a sin, " without charging the apostles of Christ with 
conniving at such sin." " For the Assembly to make slave- 
holding a bar to communion would be to dissolve itself. r ' — 
Vide statements of Pres. Blanchard and Cincinnati Herald of 
May 28, 1845 ; Chr. Inv., June, 1847. 

In 1847, the General Assembly reaffirmed all its former 
testimonies on slavery, contradictory as they were. 

In 1850, in reply to a resolution of the General Association 
of Massachusetts communicated to the General Assembly, and 
very courteously expressing their conviction that the cause 
of religion required the removal of slavery from the churches, 
the General Assembly adopted the following: 

Resolved, " That our delegates to the next General Association of Massa- 
chusetts be directed to inform that venerable body that this General Assem- 
bly must consider itself the best judge of the action which it is necessary 
for it to take as to all subjects within its jurisdiction, and that any interfer- 
ence on the part of that General Association with its action upon any subject 
upon which this General Assembly has taken action, is offensive, and must 
lead to an interruption of the correspondence which subsists between that 
Association and the General Assembly." — Oberlin Evan., June 19, 1850. 

From the Old School we now turn to the New. 



" He stated that the unhappy divisions in the Presbyterian Church had grown out 
of this opposition" (i. e. to " the proceedings and designs of the Abolition Society"), 
" and, painful as it was, they were obliged to rend the church to avoid being engulfed 
in the sentiments, feelings, and schemes of abolitionists." 

At other times, the ground of division had been stated to be the heresy of " New 
School" theology, and tendencies towards Congregational Church government in the 
New School portion of the Presbyterian Church. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 157 

NEW-SCHOOL GENERAL ASSEMBLY. 

" In 1838, the New-School General Assembly appointed a committee on 
anti-slavery memorials, which reported ' that the applicants, for reasons 
satisfactory to themselves, have withdrawn their papers.' The committee 
was discharged." — Birncfs American Churches, &.C., p. 33. 

The excuse was, that business connected with the division 
of the two assemblies made it difficult to attend to another 
subject. 

li In 1839, it referred the whole subject to the Presbyteries, to do what 
they might deem advisable." 

In 1810, a large number of memorials and petitions against slavery were 
sent in, and referred to the usual committee. The committee reported a 
resolution — referring to what had been done last year* — declaring it inex- 
pedient for the Assembly to do anything further on the subject. Several 
attempts were made by the abolition members of the Assembly to obtain a 
decided expression of its views, but they proved ineffectual, and the whole 
subject was indefinitely postponed." — lb. 

This measure was adopted on motion of " Rev. Samuel H. Cox, D.D., 
of the city of Brooklyn (N. Y.) On the motion being carried, he exult- 
ingly said : " Oub Vesuvius is safely capped for three years" — the Assembly 
not meeting again till 1843. — lb. 

" In 1813, the General Assembly censured the action of those anti- 
slavery Presbyteries which had excluded slaveholding from their pulpits 
and communion tables, and requested them to rescind their acts ; thus con- 
demning them for obeying their own advice, or excluding slaveholding from 
fellowship." — Letter of Pres. Blanchard, &c. 

In 1846, the General Assembly adopted a paper drawn up 
by Dr. Duffield, declaring the unrighteous and oppressive 
character of slavery, lamenting its continued existence in the 
churches, exhorting to the use of all means in their power to 
put it away from them, since no mere mitigation of its severity 
"would be regarded as a testimony against the system, or as, 
in the least degree, changing its essential character." 

After all this, the Assembly, nevertheless, at the same time, 

* The language employed, either in 1839 or '40, we believe, was this : " Solemnly 
referring the whole subject to the lower judicatories, to take such action as in their 
judgment is most judicious and adapted to remove the evil" — refusing the request 
of Rev. Geo. Beecher to insert the word moral before evil; that is, they refused to 
ca'.i Blavery a nioral evil. — Vide Letter of Pres. Blanchard and others. 



158 GEE AT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

proceeded to say that it " cannot determine the degree of moral 
turpitude involved" — " cannot pronounce a judgment of general 
and promiscuous condemnation," — it recognizes "embarrass- 
ments and obstacles in the way of emancipation "—it cannot 
" exclude slaveholders from the table of the Lord " — it would 
rather " sympathize with and succor them in their embarrass- 
ments " — it condemns all divisive and schismatic measures 
tending to destroy the unity, and disturb the peace of our Churchy 
The " Assembly possesses no legislative or judicial authority ;" 
it must, therefore, " leave it with the Sessions, Presbyteries, and 
Synods," &c, &c. I— -Vide Ghr. Inv., June, 1847. 

The confusion, incongruity, and self-contradiction of this 
action, can hardly escape notice, even when our attention is 
confined to the doings of this one session. Slavery is charac- 
terized as unrighteous and oppressive ; but this unrighteous- 
ness and oppression must not be promiscuously condemned, 
nor excluded from the table of the Lord, lest it should destroy 
the unity and disturb the peace of the Church. 

Still more confused, incongruous, and self-contradictory 
does the action of the General Assembly appear, when the 
doings of one session, in one year, are compared with those of 
another. In 1889, the whole subject was referred to the Pres- 
byteries ; in 1813, the Presbyteries were censured for acting, 
and requested to rescind their acts ; but in 1846 the subject 
was again referred to the Presbyteries. In 1846, as in 1889, 
the Assembly possessed no legislative or judicial authority ; 
but in 1843 its powers appear to have been ample. The true 
solution seems to be that the Assembly has no power against 
slavery, but claims and exercises power in its favor. It could 
not censure slavery, but it could censure Presbyteries by 
whom slavery is censured. It could go further than this, 
and restore to his former standing, a minister (Dr. Graham) 
who, in 1845, had been suspended by his Presbytery (acting 
on recommendation of the Assembly,) for defending slavery 
by the Bible.* This was done in 1846, or afterwards. 

* He maintained that Jesus Christ " has authorized slaveholding, in the charters 
of the Church, and in all the laws he ever made, for its regulation." 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 159 

The General Assembly of 1846 also invited the Old Sehool 
General Assembly, then sitting in the same city, to unite with 
them in a celebration of the Lord's Supper, but the invitation 
was declined, and the Old School Assembly bears the blame 
of the "schism." 

Thus does the Presbyterian New School, like the Methodist 
Episcopal Church North, by a fair implication, profess that 
slavery is not to be regarded as a sufficient cause of division, 
or a bar against Christian communion. This will further ap- 
pear as we proceed. 

In 1819, the General Assembly, in strange forgetfulness, 
one would think, of the facts conceded or implied in its testi- 
mony of 1816, declared : 

" That there has been no information before this Assembly to prove that 
the members of our Church, in the slave States, are not doing all they can 
(situated as they are, in the providence of God) to bring about the posses- 
sion and enjoyment of liberty by the enslaved." — Copied from Letter of 
Pres. Blanchard, &c. 

The slaveholders could, at any time, if they pleased, give 
their slaves a "pass" into the Free States, which, in most 
cases, would not only be eagerly accepted, but carried into 
operation with little or no expense or trouble to the masters, 
to say nothing of the practicability, in Kentucky, &c, of ma- 
king them legally free on the soil. 

In 1850, the General Assembly, (no longer triennial,*) came 
together again, and after a long discussion, during which, a 
number of propositions for acting against slavery were rejected, 
settled down upon a declaration very closely resembling that 
of 1816, so far as direct action by the General Assembly is 
concerned. 

Among the propositions rejected, one, presented by " Eev. 



* In 1S49, overtures were sent down to the Presbyteries in favor of making the 
Qeneral Assemblies animal again, instead of triennial, and in 1850, on their coming 
together, the answers being favorable, the constitution was changed back again, 
making the meetings henceforth annual. The policy of having triennial conven- 
tions had answered its purpose, there being now no fires in the " Vesuvius" to 
threaten an explosion. 



160 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

H. Curtiss of Indiana," was, "That the enslaving of men, or 
the holding of them as property, is an offence, as defined in 
our Book of Discipline, Chap. L, Sec. 3, and that as such, it 
calls for inquiry, correction, and removal, in the manner pre- 
scribed by our rules, and should be treated with a due regard 
to all the aggravating or mitigating circumstances of each par- 
ticular case " — also, " that this General Assembly, in the ex- 
ercise of its power of bearing testimony against immorality in 
practice, and "of attempting reformation of manners, and the 
promotion of charity, truth, and holiness, through all the 
churches under their care,' do most earnestly recommend to 
the proper judicatories to take measures in accordance with 
the foregoing principles." 

This would seem sufficiently mild and guarded, if the As- 
sembly had been willing to meet directly, the sin, in any way 
of effective reproof. 

Equally so was another proposition presented by P. F. 
Smith, an Elder, from Pennsylvania, affirming that slavehold- 
ing was "prima facia an offence within the meaning of our 
Book of Discipline," and throwing upon the slaveholder " the 
burden of showing such circumstances," as " will take away 
from him the o;uilt of the offence." 

The rejection of these propositions will assist the reader to 
a better understanding of the propositions adopted by the 
Assembly, the most pointed of which was the following : 

That slavery " is fraught with many and great evils.'''' That they 
'"deplore the workings* of the whole system of slavery," and that "the 
holding- of our fellow-men in the condition of slavery, except in those cases 
where it is unavoidable by the laws of the State, the obligations of guardian- 
ship, or the demands of humanity, is an offence in the proper import of that 
term, as used in the Book of Discipline, Chap. I., Sec. 3, and should be 
regarded and treated in the same manner as other offences." Also referring 
the subject to the " Sessions and Presbyteries, &c." 

* In 1846, the General Assembly had culled slavery "unrighteous." Having 
failed to purge away this "unrighteousness," it must, in 1S50, be spoken of in milder 
terms. It is only an "evil," the " workings" of which are " deplorable." Among 
its " deplorable workings" should be reckoned its power to neutralize and alter the 
moral creed of the church. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 161 

The exccjitions above specified will be found to embrace 
the very excuses in view of which all slaveholders continue 
the practice, except those who justify slavery " in the abstract, " 
and consider it a blessing instead of an evil. 

Even this action, however, was strenuously opposed. 

" The vote stood 84 to 16, under a written protest of the minority who 
were for no action, in the present state of the country. Two were excused 
from voting." — JV. Y. Observer, June 15, 1850. 

The adoption of even this evasive testimony is to be con- 
strued in the light of the following action, by the same body, 
at the same session, by which, after this idle show of threaten- 
ing some sorts of slaveholders with Church discipline, the New 
School General Assembly eagerly throws its arms of embrace 
around all sorts of slaveholders in the Old School Assembly, 
including slavery propagandists, extensionists, slave sellers, 
and all. A statement was unanimously adopted, of which the 
following is the substance : 

This Assembly cherished the idea of re-union, (with the Old School 
Assembly,) until 1841, when it was reluctantly relinquished. "Again, in 
1846 they expressed the desire for union with our brethern, and, pained by 
the unusual exhibition of two such bodies, at apparent strife with each other, 
they proposed to the other Assembly, a mutual recognition of each other, by 
communing together at the table of our Master." " These propositions and 
overtures were all made in good faith." " We do not pretend to question 
the motives of our brethren in rejecting them." 

Declining, under these circumstances, to make any new overtures, the 
Report and the Assembly, say : 

" We should be untrue to ourselves, before God and the world, did we not 
frankly avow our readiness to meet in a spirit of fraternal kindness and 
christian love, any overtures which may be made to us by the other body." 
—See JV. Y. Observer, June 15, 1850. 

Thus, then, " before God and the world," the New School 
General Assembly of 1850 "unanimously" declared .itself 
ready to commune with the Old School, at a time when the 
great body of Old School Presbyterians at the South were 
zealous for the extension of slavery, claimed of the Federal 
Government its extension as an act of justice, and defended it 

11 



162 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

as a Bible institution. — See letter of a Southern Clergyman in 
New York Observer, same date as the above. 

The discriminating reader will now judge for himself re- 
specting the moral difference between the Old School and the 
!New, in their relations to slavery. The one has more slave- 
holders under its jurisdiction than the other, but both tolerate 
the practice.* The one does this to retain many members ; 
the other to retain a few. The one does it believing slavery 
to be a Bible institution ; the other, believing it to be " un- 
righteous" and "oppressive." The one makes no pretence 
of any intention to discipline any sort of slaveholders ; the 
other holds the rod over a class of them that it " has no infor- 
mation " of being found within its enclosures, but yearns to 
go out of its boundaries to clasp them to its bosom. 

In 1851, the General Assembly met at Utica, New York. 
It declined to take action against slavery, and won the com- 
mendation of President Fillmore, who expressed to some 
members of the Assembly his high gratification with the pro- 
ceedings. 



* The following statement is from a lecture by Pres. Blanchard, as reported in the 
Cleveland True Democrat of Sept. 26, 1351 : 

" The Old School branch has now //fy slaveholding Presbyteries; more than one- 
third of its whole number. 

" The New School Assembly, at its first separate meeting, in 1838, was followed 
by but three slaveholding commissioners, and there was fervent prayer and strong 
hope that this might become an anti-slavery body. But once separated from the Old 
School, and seized by the natural desire for denominational success, its has steadily 
increased its slaveholding wing till it has now twenty slaveholding Presbyteries, 
between one and two hundred ministers, and from fifteen to twenty thousand mem- 
bers, in the slave States, all tcalking in Christian fellowship) with slaveholders. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 163 



CHAPTER XIV. 

POSITION OF THE AMERICAN CHURCHES, ETC. CONTINUED. 
III. — CONGREGATIONALISTS. 

Connection with Presbyterians and the South — Pro-slavery Sermons — Prof. Stuart — 
Andover Theo. Seminary — General Association of Connecticut, 1834, 1S36, 1S40, 
1845 — Rejected Resolutions compared with Resolutions Adopted — General Asso. 
of Massachusetts, 1834, 1837, 1849— Convention of Cong. Ministers, 1848— Gen. 
Conf. of Maine — Cong. Periodicals, N. E. Spectator, Vermont Chronicle. 

Congregationalists, like Baptists, are subject to the con- 
trol of no ecclesiastical body, holding jurisdiction over the 
■whole country. Unlike Baptists, Presbyterians, and Metho- 
dists, they number no churches, or none sufficient to deserve 
notice, in the present slaveholding States. They claim to be, 
emphatically, the descendants and successors of the Puritans, 
and of that particular branch of them whose democratic polity 
gave origin to the free institutions — so far as they are free — 
of republican America. Congregationalists have had, more- 
over, the chief influence in moulding the religious and moral 
sentiment of New England ; they have their central home and 
seat in the birth-place of Hopkins and Edwards, the scene of 
their agitating anti-slavery labors, in the atmosphere of a theo- 
logical literature enriched by those luminaries, and still cher- 
ished in the churches as a badge of honorable distinction. 
Theoretically, they are, for the most part, or claim to be, of 
the same creed or phase of religious faith, the very technicali- 
ties of which are identified with the most uncompromising of 
all schemes of ethics, allowing no palliatives of transgression, 
no exceptions to the demand of immediate and unconditional 



164 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

abandonment of all sin. Assuredly, then, Congregationalists 
can have no valid excuse, if they are not foremost in their 
opposition to slavery. Of those to whom much is given shall 
much be required. 

But Congregationalists, through their Associations of Min- 
isters, have held regular correspondence and close affinity with 
Presbyterians ; have received delegates from the General As- 
sembly, and sent delegates to them. Congregational ministers 
removing out of New England, have readily become Presby- 
terian. And Presbyterian ministers have been received as 
pastors of Congregational churches. Congregationalism in 
Connecticut has been so modified as to be claimed by Presby- 
terian writers as being virtually Presbyterian. In the Middle 
and Northwestern States, a "plan of accommodation," so 
called, has brought churches claiming to be Congregational 
into connection with the Presbyteries. In all these ways, as 
well as by missionary co-operation, by plans and processes of 
ministerial education, as well as by similarity of creed, and 
identity of rituals and forms of public worship, the cord of 
sympathy and the bond of unity between Congregationalists 
and Presbyterians have been strengthened. Congregational 
ministers, educated in New England, transferred to the Presby- 
terian church, and located, by the enterprising spirit of New 
England emigration, in the slaveholding- States, have often be- 
come slaveholders themselves, and defenders or apologists of 
the slave system, and commonly without forfeiting their reli- 
gious character or ecclesiastical standing with their friends 
and relatives in New England.* The same spirit of emigra- 



* The following statement, made by "Rev. A. H. H. Boyd, of Virginia," in the 
New School General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church, in 1850, has a bearing 
quite as appropriate and significant upon northern Congregationalists, as upon 
northern Presbyterians : 

" In the Southern country we depend upon the north for ministers, in a great 
. measure. Few of our Southern young men are educated for ministers. In some 
parts it is necessary that some born South should endorse a minister, before com- 
mencing his labor, because some have endeavored to loosen the relation of master 
and slave." — N. Y. Observer, June 15, 1850. 

A similar remark would apply to schoolmasters, only that there is, perhaps, les3 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 105 

tion, and especially the habit of temporary sojourn, or resi- 
dence, as school teachers, or as commercial adventurers, in 
the slaveholding States, has drawn large numbers of Congre- 
gational laymen into close sympathy with Presbyterian slave 
holders at the South, with whom they have worshipped. Be- 
coming comparatively wealthy, and returning home to the 
North, to settle for life, not a few of them, though preferring 
for their own comfort a residence in a free State, have lost 
their abhorrence of the sin of slavery, and have exerted a 
wide and strong influence in favor of a religious fraternity 
with slaveholders. Intermarriages between slaveholding and 
non-slaveholding families, commercial intercourse, and politi- 
cal co-operation, are thrown into the same scale. 

Congregationalists in New England, as well as other mem- 
bers of churches, and perhaps to a greater extent than in most 
other sects at the North, as being most numerous and enter- 
prising, have been subjected to influences of this character. 
Besides all this, Congregational ministers in New England, 
along with other gentlemen of the learned professions, (who 
were then chiefly members of congregational churches,) con- 
stituted a large portion of the few who were slaveholders, 
during the existence of slavery in the Northern and Easteife: 
States, there being few, then, in New England, of other reli- 
gious sects, thus making that denomination responsible for a 
very great portion of all the slaveholding that ever existed in 
New England. And there is no reason to think that all of 
these slaveholding Congregationalists, whether laymen or 
ministers, ever welcomed heartily and fully the radical views 
of Hopkins and Edwards on this subject, or ceased to become 
slaveholders until slaveholding became impracticable under 
the State laws. 

It would be idle to suppose that facts like these would be 
without their significance and bearing in that general decline 

jealousy of them. Schoolmasters and ministers for the South have been reckoned 
among the staple exports of New England, and they are commonly adapted to the 
market. Can the Congregational churches of New England, which supply a large 
share of these teachers of religion and literature, he uninfluenced by such facts ? 



166 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

of the spirit of liberty already noticed, or that they could fail 
to affect the position of the Congregational ministers and 
churches of New England, on the opening of the present anti- 
slavery contest. 

The distribution of the Princeton pamphlet among the 
members of the Presbyterian General Assembly, at Pittsburg, 
in 1836, before mentioned, was the beginning of a series of 
similar demonstrations among clergymen at the North, not 
excepting Congregational ministers in New England, from 
whom at least three printed sermons in biblical defence or 
palliation of slavery appeared not long afterwards. They 
were echoes of the Princeton doctrine, not marked with any 
unusual force of reasoning; and, not coming from sources 
particularly suited to arrest attention, they produced no very 
deep, general, or permanent impression. The most remark- 
able thing in respect to them was, that they procured for their 
authors no such ecclesiastical disclaimers, in the proceedings 
of their respective associations and consociations, as those 
with which the doctrines or measures of abolitionists in the 
same ecclesiastical connections were so bountifully visited 
about the same time. If not fully approved, they were not 
accounted so heretical as to deserve the notice that would 
have been given to any departure from their recognized the- 
ological standards. The same doctrine from Dr. Graham, 
some years afterwards, was branded as a heresy by the Pres- 
byterian Synod of Cincinnati. But in 1836 it does not appear 
to have been regarded as " heresy," by the Congregational 
bodies in New England, whatever may be supposed to have 
been the prevalent sentiment among them. 

Nor can it be said that any remarkable improvement was 
perceptible in 1837. In that year an occasion presented itself 
for remonstrating against the heresy of biblical human chat- 
telhood, had it been accounted a heresy, as promulgated from 
a quarter that could not be accounted too obscure to require 
notice. 

Moses Stuart, Professor in the Theological Seminary at 
Andover, Mass., stood then, and for many years afterwards, 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 167 

at the very head of the department of sacred literature among 
the Congregationalists in New England. To him, more than 
to any other man living at that time, and while he held his 
professorship, were biblical students of the Congregational 
order encouraged to look up for solid instruction in the 
science of expounding the Scriptures. What he might say 
concerning the teachings of the Bible on the subject of slavery 
would be likely to exert, at least, as powerful an influence 
among Congregationalists as the expressed opinions of any 
other man. 

The late Dr. Fisk, then President of the Wesleyan Univer- 
sity, at Middletown, Conn., whose views of slavery the reader 
has seen in our account of the position of the Methodist Epis- 
copal Church, addressed a letter to Prof. Stuart, designed to 
draw out, for publication, his views of the slave question. 
The following is an extract from Prof. Stuart's answer: 

" 1. The precepts of the New Testament respecting the demeanor of slaves 
and of their masters, beyond all question recognize the existence of slavery. 
The masters are, in part, ' believing masters,' so that a precept to them, how 
they are to behave, as masters, recognizes that the relation may exist, salva 
fide, et salva ccclesia* Otherwise, Paul had nothing to do but to cut the 
bond asunder at once. He could not lawfully and properly temporize with 
a malum in se.i 

" If any one doubts, let him take the case of Paul's sending Onesimus 
back to Philemon, with an apology for his running away, and sending him 
back to be a servant for life. The relation did exist, may exist. The abuse 
of it is the essential and fundamental wrong. Not that the theory of slavery 
is, in itself, right. No. ' Love thy neighbor as thyself — ' Do unto others 
that which ye would that others should do unto you,' decide against this. 
But the relation once constituted and continued, is not such a malum in se 
as calls for immediate and violent disrupture, at all hazards. So Paul did 
not counsel. 

" 2. 1 Tim. 6 : 2, expresses the sentiment that slaves who are Christians, 
and have Christian masters, are not, on that account, and because, as Chris- 
tians they are brethren, to forego the reverence due to them as masters. 
That is, the relation of master and slave is not, as a matter of course, abro- 
gated between all Christians. Nay, servants should, in such a case, 



* i. e. " Without violating the Christian faith, or the Church." 
t i. e. Tltat which is, in itself, »in. 



168 GEE AT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

a fortiori, do their duty cheerfully. This sentiment lies on the very face 
of the case. What the master's duty in such a case, in respect to libera- 
tion, is another question, and one which the apostle does not here treat of." 

Learned men are not always wise. Beneficial as the science 
of biblical exigesis may be, when needed, and when directed 
by Christian simplicity and manly common sense, it can never 
be otherwise than powerless, except for mischief, when wielded 
either without or against them, or when used to mystify and 
perplex what is already plain. Aside from such glosses as 
those just now quoted, and in the absence of the iniquitous 
practices that gave rise to them, no simple-minded reader of 
the New Testament would ever have detected in the passages 
commented upon, the slightest sanction of such usages as 
those that go to define modern slaveholding. The art, most 
assuredly, is not a desirable one, that could thus torture and 
invert the plain import of Paul's Letter to Philemon., In this 
instance, the beautiful and affectionate dissuasive of " Paul 
the aged " against the too rigid exaction of an honest debt, 
voluntarily assumed, is transmuted into an apostolic warranty 
and example for the rendition of fugitive slaves. This result 
could not be reached without a palpable and direct falsifica- 
tion of the text ; which says, " Eeceive him " — " Not now as 
a servant, but above a servant, a brother beloved," "both 
in the flesh, and in the Lord :" — a brother, in the secular as 
well as the religious acceptation of the term. Instead of this, 
the apostle is represented as " sending him back to be a ser- 
vant for life." Onesimus was not a slave, for a slave can 
make no contract and incur no debt. Yet Paul entreated 
(what he says he might have enjoined by authority), that the 
obligation should be cancelled. But whatever we consider 
to be the relation between the parties, the entire drift of the 
epistle was evidently to induce a change, and not a continu- 
ance, of the relation. 

In his exposition of 1 Tim. 6 : 2, the learned writer coolly 
took for granted the very gist of the controversy, by assuming 
that the word rendered "master" is equivalent to "slave- 
holder," and that there could have been no "servants" but 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 1G9 

" slaves." It had often been shown that this was not the fact, 
but the Professor takes no notice of this, and makes no attempt 
to prove or show the contrary. 

It would be difficult to reconcile Prof. Stuart with himself, 
or with the plain dictates of the Christian religion and of 
common sense, which the learned and the unlearned can 
equally understand. The following propositions and results 
will be found involved in his statements : 

"The theory of slavery is not, in itself, right;" but the prac- 
tice of slavery is not, in itself, wrong. 

The law of love and the golden rule decide the question of 
slavery one way, but Paul's advice to servants and masters, 
and his sending back Onesimus, decide it the other way. 

The relation may exist without violating Christianity or 
the Church, but the relation is founded in a theory that is 
not, in itself, right ; in other words, Christianity and the 
Church are not violated by the opposite of moral right. 

The " abuse'" of the relation "is the fundamental and essen- 
tial lorong" but the relation itself cannot claim its origin in 
moral right. 

The relation, though not founded in moral right, when 
" once constituted 1 " is not a moral wrong. 

Paul "could not temporize with" what was wrong in 
itself; but he would not " cut asunder at once " the bond of 
a relation that was the opposite of moral right. 

And while the Professor decides promptly that Paul would 
not do this, he confesses he cannot tell what Paul would say 
of " the duty of the master in respect to liberation ," because that 
question was " one of which the apostle does not here 
treat of." 

" The duty of the master in respect to liberation " was the 
very question that then agitated the country. It was because 
abolitionists insisted upon this " duty," that they were opposed 
and censured, and the pen of Prof. Stuart was invoked to 
counteract their influence. To this end he controverted their 
doctrine, that slaveholding is sinful. If not sinful, who could 
urge upon them the " duty" of giving up the practice? But, 



170 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

after all, it is conceded that Paul was not treating of the duty 
of liberation, and Prof. Stuart does not know what he would 
have said on that subject. 

Then Paul was not treating of the lawfulness or unlawful- 
ness of slaveholding : — he was not treating on the question 
whether "the relation of master and slave" was "abrogated 
among Christians." If Prof. Stuart was aware of all this, 
why did he labor to make the contrary impression? 

Does any one now inquire whether, or to what extent, the 
Congregationalists of the North and of New England were 
responsible for these opinions of Prof. Stuart? We will 
answer by propounding another inquiry. 

Suppose Prof. Stuart, instead of writing what we have here 
quoted concerning slavery, had written a biblical defence of 
Universalism, or of some other doctrine that orthodox Con- 
gregationalists had considered "heresy." Then suppose the 
intercourse, the bearing, and .the relations of the Congrega- 
tional sect towards Prof. Stuart had continued to be what 
every one knows they were, at the time of his writing on 
slavery, and for fifteen years afterwards — we ask, whether 
orthodox Congregationalists in England, and whether public 
sentiment, the world over, would not inevitably have held 
New England Congregationalists, as a body, responsible for his 
doctrines ? 

When Dr. Graham, in the Presbyterian Church, wrote a 
biblical defence of slaveholding, his Synod suspended him 
from the ministry. Why ? Because they knew that they 
should otherwise be held responsible for his heresy ; which 
was substantially the same with that of Prof. Stuart,* who, 
had he been a member of the Synod of Cincinnati, would 
probably have been suspended, likewise. 

It may be said that Congregationalists hold no such eccle- 
siastical powers. But they hold and freely exercise (no 

* It may be said that Prof. Stuart's defence of slavery was less self-consistent than 
Dr. Graham's, containing concessions that overturned his whole argument. This 
only shows that he was not unaware that the principles of Christianity were hostile 
to slavery, while he was laboring to construe particular texts in its favor. 



SLAVERY AND EUEEDOH. 171 

"General Assembly" forbidding them) the power of with- 
drawing religious co-operation and communion. Had Prof. 
Stuart avowed himself a Universal ist, it would have been 
promptly done. And the same result would have been -wit- 
nessed had a defence of slavery been thought as heretical as 
Universalism. 

Suppose, again, that Prof. Stuart had written concerning 
adultery, or concubinage (one feature of slavery), or concern- 
ing robbery, or horse-stealing, or any other known and pro- 
scribed crime, as he wrote concerning slaveholding. Would 
or would not an impartial public sentiment abroad, or in com- 
ing ages, hold the sect responsible that continued to hold fra- 
ternity with him, to confide in him as a religious teacher, an 
accomplished educator of religious teachers ? 

No personal dislike of Prof. Stuart has occasioned these 
remarks. He had his attractive traits of character. He was 
the admired representative of a class — a very large class — of 
Congregational ministers, his associates, and pupils. His 
memory is still venerated; he is proudly pointed to, by his 
sect, as " the father of the science of biblical criticism in 
America ;" and the clergy of other sects recognize the validity 
of the claim. All this tends directly and almost irresistibly 
to confirm, in the community, the belief that slaveholding is 
not inconsistent with the Bible. If " the father of biblical 
criticism" says so, who shall contradict it ? One in ten of 
those who receive his testimony, may infer the innocency of 
slaveholding ; while nine in ten will infer the moral deficiency 
of the Bible, and this will swell the tide of horror and amaze- 
ment at " infidel abolitionism." Impartial history, if it 
attempts to look below the surface of things, and trace effects 
to their causes, must give marked prominence to influences 
like these. The real position of the sects could not other- 
wise be understood. 

It is not known that the Trustees, Faculty, and friends of 
the Theological Seminary at Andover, were ever distressed 
with the apprehension that Prof. Stuart's heresy on the slave 
question would diminish the patronage, or injure the reputa- 



172 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

tion of their institution, in which he held so conspicuous a 
post. But no one will doubt that those fears would have 
risen to a high pitch, had he dissented from the policy of the 
Colonization Society, or avowed himself an advocate of imme- 
diate and unconditional emancipation. The views of Prof. 
Stuart were extensively circulated among the Congregational 
churches and ministry of NeAV England. Had there been any 
general or earnest dissent from them, or if his intimate asso- 
ciates had been grieved at his course, the religious journals 
of the denomination would have contained evidence of the 
fact. Slight shades of difference in metaphysical speculation, 
among professors of theology, have given rise to rival claims 
among the Theological Seminaries of New England, but the 
position of the learned Professor at Andover concerning 
slavery has occasioned no manifestations of that character. 
Dissent was indeed strongly expressed; but it was the dissent 
of an inconsiderable though increasing minority, not of the 
main body. 

. It may be in place to add here, that soon after the passage, 
by Congress, of the Fugitive Slave Bill, in 1850, Prof. Stuart 
(who had previously resigned his Professorship at Andover), 
appeared as the public defender and eulogist of Hon. Daniel 
Webster, for the part' he took in procuring and vindicating 
that iniquitous measure. In company with Dr. Leonard 
Woods, late Professor at Andover, Prof. Kalph Emerson, of 
the same institution, and other Congregational ministers,* he 
gave his signature to a paper drawn up for the purpose. And 
afterwards he vindicated his position in a pamphlet, at some 
length. 

This new demonstration in favor of slavery, we are happy 
to add, appears to have been less favorably received among 
Congregationalists, than the former one. It is understood 
that most of the Professors at Andover declined signing the 
paper above-mentioned (though they entered no public protest 



* Among the names appended to this paper were those of Dr. Dana of Newhury- 
port, Rev. W. W. Rogers of Boston, Pres. Sparks of Harvard College (Unitarian), 
&c., &c. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 173 

or disclaimer against it), and the pamphlet has probably 
exerted an influence in the direction opposite to its design.* 

GENERAL ASSOCIATION OF CONNECTICUT. 

The General Association of Congregational Ministers in 
Connecticut have repeatedly defined their position in respect 
to slavery. The resolutions adopted at dillerent times are as 
follows : 

At Vernon, in 1831. Resolved, That to buy and sell human beings, or 
to hold and treat them as merchandise, or to treat servants, free or bond, in 
any manner inconsistent with the fact that they are intelligent and voluntary 
beings, made in the image of God, is a violation of the principles of the 
word of God, and should be treated by all the churches of our Lord Jesus 
Christ as an immorality, inconsistent with a profession of the Christian 
religion. 

Resolved, that this Association regards the laws and usages in respect 
to slavery, which exist in many of the States of this Union, as inconsistent 
with the character and responsibilities of a free and Christian people, and 
holds it to be the duty of every Christian, and especially of every Minister 
of the Gospel, to use all prudent and lawful efforts for the peaceful abolition 
of slavery. 

"At Norfolk, in 1836. Resolved,- that in the judgment of this Associa- 
tion, the buying and selling of human beings, and the holding them for selfish 
ends, by the ministers and members of our Churches removing to the South, 
is a great sin, and utterly inconsistent with their Christian profession. 

At New Haven, in 1840. Resolved, that American slavery, is, in the 
opinion of this body, inconsistent with the principles of the Gospel, and its 
immediate abolition by those who have the legal power, is a duty in the 
discharge of which the blessing of heaven may be expected. 

Resolved, that we recommend to the churches under our care, a prayer- 
ful consideration of this important subject, and the exertion of their appro- 
priate influence for the emancipation of all the enslaved throughout this land 
and throughout the world. 



* And yet it remains true that the Fugitive Slave Bill of 1850 has its earnest advo- 
cates among Congrcgationalists, as it certainly has among the leading ministers and 
editors of the Presbyterian and other denominations, by whom a strenuous effort 
has been made to east odium and reproach upon those who maintain, in reference 
to this enactment, that the laws of God are paramount to the unrighteous edicts of 
man, and annul them. Under such circumstances, it would seem the duty of all who 
fear God, to bear solemn testimony against such impiety. 



174 GEE AT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

In 1845. Resolved, that we again adopt these resolutions, as the 
expression of our present views, and direct our scribe to transmit a copy of 
them to the stated clerks of each of- the bodies, styled " The General 
Assembly." 

To the reader uninitiated in the nice distinctions elaborated 
by the New England Congregational Clergy, in their discus- 
sions on this subject, these Kesolutions, standing by themselves, 
would appear to be tolerably distinct testimonies against the 
practice of slaveholding. To understand them correctly, they 
must be construed in the light of what the same bodies 
refused to say, on the same subject, and also in the light of the 
discussions had, at the time of adopting them. 

We will, therefore, put them by the side of the resolutions 
"offered by Kev. Mr. Perkins of Meriden, in 1845," but not 
adopted : 

" Whereas, this Association has frequently delivered its opinions in rela- 
tion to slaveholding — and whereas, recent events, such as the imprisonment 
of Christian men, on the charge of aiding slaves to escape, and the late 
action of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church, seems to 
require the reiteration of our views, therefore resolved : 

" 1st. That we consider slaveholding as an outrage on human rights, and 
at variance with the spirit of Christianity. 

" 2d. That no man is bound in conscience to obey slave law. 

" 3d. That while it may be matter of judgment and expediency what 
measures should be taken, and what risks incurred in aiding the colored man to 
escape from bondage, as once the like considerations should have been weighed 
in deciding how far we should have gone in aiding a white slave to escape 
from Algiers ; yet the right to give such aid, we hold to be undeniable. 

" 4th. That we recommend, to our churches, to give a place to the slave 
in their prayers and benevolent efforts, together with the usual religious 
objects of the day. 

" 5th. That our delegate to the General Assembly of the Presbyterian 
Church, carry from us to that body, a letter on its connection with slavery." 

After a' long debate, these Resolutions were set aside, and 
the action taken which has already been recorded. On a 
comparison it will be seen that the Association declined saying 
that "no man is bound in conscience to obey slave law" — 
declined expressing sympathy for " Christian men," imprison- 
ed on charge of aiding fugitive slaves — declined affirming the 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 175 

right of assisting such fugitives — declined recommending to 

the Churches to place anti-slavery efforts with other benevolent 
and religious objects — declined addressing to the General 
Assembly of the Presbyterian Church, a letter on its connection 
with slavery. 

On a further examination of the Resolutions at different 
times adopted by the General Association, and re-affirmed in 
1845, some further differences between the sentiments express- 
ed, and the rejected resolutions of Mr. Perkins, will be 
manifest. 

The General Association, even in 1834, had learned, it 
seems, to condemn " slavery" rather than " slaveholding." The 
distinction was not then understood by the public as it has 
since been insisted on, and the preamble of Mr. Perkins, stat- 
ing that the General Association had "frequently delivered 
its opinions in relation to slaveholding" seems to have been 
considered too inaccurate a statement (as doubtless it was) to 
be endorsed. The Association had not condemned the act, 
but only the abstraction. 

The resolutions of 1834 expended their strength upon " laws 
and usages," rather than upon persons doing a wrong act un- 
der shelter of them. They would be understood at the South 
as bearing against the slave trade, rather than against slave 
holding. They suggested, likewise the implication of a senti- 
ment since insisted on, that slaves may be held ivithout being 
" treated as merchandise, " and that the distinction between 
"bond and free " is, by no means, the significant point in that 
matter. 

The resolution of 1836, plainly condemns buying, selling, 
and holding human beings as slaves, only when it is done for 
selfish ends ; thus teaching, by implication, the doctrine now 
openty insisted on, that all this may be innocently and even 
laudably done, for benevolent ends — which is all the license the 
slaveholder asks. He thinks he only holds slaves for their 
own good. 

The resolution of 1840 retains the same distinction between 
slavery and slave-holding ; that is, slavery in the abstract, and 



176 GEE AT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

slavery in practice; the former being almost universally con- 
demned : the latter, very extensively defended or palliated. 

The debates on the proposed Eesolutions of Mr. Perkins 
illustrate the meaning of the Eesolutions adopted. 

Rev. Mr. Andrews vindicated the course of the General Assembly. 
Slavery (he said) existed in the time of Christ and his apostles. They 
did not condemn it. He would vote for no resolution that did not distinctly 
avow that slaveholding was not sin. 

Rev. E. Hall, of Norwalk, said that if he supposed there was the least 
danger that these resolutions would pass, he would make a strenuous speech. 
He abhorred slavery totally, and from the bottom of his heart, but these 
resolutions were rank Garrisonism and Dorrism. He could not think more 
than one or two persons would vote for them. 

Dr. Bennett Tyler (of the Theological Seminary at East Windsor) said 
that " Christ and his apostles did not condemn slaveholders, nor command 
them to emancipate their slaves." 

" Rev. Mr. Ely" repeated the old story of Paul's returning a fugitive 
slave to his master. He would seek the conversion of the slaves first, and 
then seek their liberty in the Lord's way and in the Lord's time. 

The New York Observer, in its account of this matter, declares that the 
resolutions introduced by Mr. Perkins were the most ultra and untenable 
ever heard of in any ecclesiastical body. 

A severer satire upon "ecclesiastical bodies "it would be 
difficult to indite. If the Eesolutions of Mr. Perkins were too 
ultra, there was an opportunity presented to the General As- 
sociation, had they been disposed, to have adopted others of a 
sufficiently accommodating character. 

Rev. S. W. S. Dutton was convinced that the resolutions of Mr. Perkins 
would not pass. If they were disposed of, he would offer the following : 

" 1. Resolved, That the buying and selling of human beings for gain; 
the forced separation of husbands and wives, parents and children ; the per- 
mission, by masters, to servants under their control, to live in a temporary 
concubinage, liable to be ended at any time by the caprice of either party, 
or by the caprice of others ; the withholding the Bible and the ability to 
read the Bible, by masters, from servants under their control and care ; and 
in general, the treatment of servants by masters in any manner inconsis- 
tent with their nature as immortal beings, for whom Christ gave himself 
to die, are crimes utterly inconsistent with a standing and a name in the 
Church of Christ. 

"2. Resolved, That all those laws, whether of individual States or of 
the United States, which, instead of prohibiting and punishing these crimes. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 177 

require, or encourage, or allow them, are a foul disgrace to a people who 
glory in the possession of freedom as Cod's inalienable gift to man, and ari 
deeply to be deplored by all friends of their country, as fitted to call down 
upon it the direst judgments of heaven. 

" 3. Whereas, There is a common fame, the cry of which has gone 
abroad to the ends of the earth, that these crimes are perpetrated by minis- 
ters and members in both branches of the Presbyterian Church in this 
sountry ; therefore, 

" Resolved, That our delegates be directed to present a copy of these 
resolutions to each branch of the Presbyterian Church, with our fraternal 
request, that the truth of this common fame be publicly denied, or, if that 
be inconsistent with facts, that proper and effectual measures be taken to 
bring the offenders to repentance." 

These Kesolutions are similar in spirit to those presented to 
the American Board at Brooklyn, the same year, by Dr. 
Leonard Bacon of New Ilaven, and unsuccessfully advocated 
by him, on that occasion. He also advocated the above reso- 
lutions of Mr. Dutton, before the General Association of Con- 
necticut. 

"What objection could there have been against them ? They 
were specially designed to waive the mooted questions of the 
sinfulness both of slavery and slaveholding, and fix upon what 
are claimed to be the abases of the system. He urged upon 
the Board, and upon the General Assembly, the importance 
of condemning, distinctly, these practices. 

"Why could it not be done ? Why, but because, instead of 
an indefinite and vague abstraction there was an inconvenient 
and well understood specification of prevalent practices ; of 
practices which would criminate the great body of religious 
slaveholders at the South? Because, moreover, the third 
Eesolution would be understood at the South as evidence that 
the General Association of Connecticut were in earnest for the 
removal of these practices. 

It will be seen, on inspection, that the action of the General 
Association of Connecticut does not conflict with the positions 
of Professor Stuart, or, at least, only as Professor Stuart's 
positions conflict with each other. Self-consistency is not to 
be expected, where the effort is to avoid the condemnation of 

12 



178 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

that which common sense and common decency will not con- 
sent to defend. 



GENERAL ASSOCIATION OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

This body of Congregational Ministers have been led to re- 
cord a somewhat different testimony, and one which it might 
be difficult to reconcile with their patronage of Professor Stu- 
art, and of the American Board. 

In 1834 the General Association adopted the following 
Eesolutions : 

" 1. Resolved, That the slavery existing in this country, by which more 
than two millions of our countrymen are deprived of their inalienable rights, 
and held and treated as mere merchandise, is a violation of the law of God 
and the fundamental principles of our national government. 

" 2. That this Association regards those usages and laws in the slave- 
holding States which withhold the Bible as a book to be read from the 
slave population, as inconsistent with the spirit of Christianity. 

" 3. That we deeply sympathize with our enslaved brethren, and com- 
mend their cause to the prayers of the Christian Church. 

" 4. That the efforts recently made in some of the slaveholding States 
for imparting religious instructions to the slaves, are regarded by us with 
lively hope and earnest prayers for their universal extension. 

" 5. That the principles and objects of the American Anti-Slavery So- 
ciety, so far as they do not come in collision with the American Coloniza- 
tion Society, meet with our approbation." 

A sixth resolution recommended the Colonization Society to 
the continued sujjport of the churches, by collections on the 
Fourth of July, &c. How far the first three resolutions were 
congruous with the remaining ones, and how w r ell they com- 
ported with the subsequent activities of those who voted for* 
them, we do not now stop to inquire. But it is proper to re- 
mark that these resolutions were adopted in the presence of 
the agents of the two societies, (the Anti-slavery and the Col- 
onization,) who were pressing their rival claims, and at a time 
when the opposition of leading Colonizationists to the Anti- 
slaver}' movement had diminished the receipts of the Coloni- 
zation Society. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 179 

In 1837, the General Association adopted the following : 

" Whereas, Slavery, as it exists in our country, is a great moral and 
social evil ; and whereas, no man should feel indifferent respecting that 
which the God of heaven disapproves, therefore, 

" 1. Resolved, That the assumed right of holding our fellow-men in bond- 
age, working them without wages, and buying and selling them as property, 
is obviously contrary to the principles of natural justice and the spirit of 
the gospel, offensive to God, and ought to cease with the least possible 
delay. 

" 2. Resolved, That we approve of free and candid discussion on the sub- 
ject of slavery, and also of all other proper methods of diffusing light and 
promoting correct moral sentiment, which may have an influence to do away 
the evil."— Eman., Aug. 10, 1837. 

How well these resolutions, especially the second, corres- 
pond with the action of the General Association at the same 
session, and the year previous, in respect to the labors of anti- 
slavery lecturers among their churches, the reader will judge 
when he shall have seen the record, in another chapter, of the 
opposition raised against abolitionists. For the present, we 
let it stand disconnected with those matters, and by the side 
of other Congregational testimonies concerning slavery. 

In 18-19, the General Association adopted the following: 

" Resolved, That, in maintaining correspondence and connection with 
the two General Assemblies of the Presbyterian Church, we look with deep 
solicitude upon the position of these bodies with respect to the sin of 
slavery ; that our own strong sympathies are with those brethren in these 
Assemblies who are laboring in an earnest and Christian spirit to put an end 
to this evil ; and that we desire our delegates to those Assemblies, in a 
decided but courteous manner, to express our deep conviction, that the right 
of the enslaved, the cause of true religion, and the honor of the Great Head 
of the Church, require those ecclesiastical bodies to use all their legitimate 
power and influence for the speedy removal of slavery from the churches 
under their supervision." 

The fact of a religious connection and fraternal intercourse 
between the Congregationalists of Massachusetts and the slave- 
holding Presbyterians of the South, is here distinctly recog- 
nized, an item of some importance, as we sometimes hear it 
confidently denied. The manner in which the Old School 
General Assembty, as already mentioned, repulsed this remon- 



180 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

strance, affords some evidence that they regarded it as having 
been uttered in earnest. It affords, at the same time, an occa- 
sion and an opportunity for the General Association of Massa- 
chusetts to show, by their future course and position, whether 
they are prepared to carry out the principles involved in this 
testimony. The alternative is now fairly presented to them, 
of forbearing a repetition of that testimony, or of ceasing 
to " maintain correspondence and connection " with the Old 
School Presbyterian Church. 

The Convention of Congregational Ministers of 
Massachusetts, in 1848, appointed a committee to prepare a 
report on slavery. The committee made an elaborate report 
in 1849. The Convention approving of " the general prin- 
ciples and results of the same," authorized its publication.* 
The annual report of the Am. & For. A. S. Society says, that 
it contains some things which they (the anti-slavery commit- 
tee) cannot approve, but that, on the whole, it bears " a faithful 
testimony against the wrongfulness of slavery." From some 
extracts it appears that this document denies that " slavery, 
as it exists in the United States, and as it has been legalized," 
is sanctioned by the Bible. It affirms that the Mosaic institu- 
tions are " utterly repugnant, and destructive to, all slavehold- 
ing and slavery ;" and finally, that " it well becomes the Con- 
vention of Congregational Ministers of this ancient Common- 
wealth solemnly to declare to the world their deep conviction 
of the injustice and inhumanity of the system of slavery, and 
of its absolute repugnance to all the principles of the word 
of God." 

GENERAL CONFERENCE OF MAINE. 

This body is composed of Congregational ministers and lay 
delegates. In 1836, the Conference 

" Resolved, That slaveholding, as it exists in a portion of these United 
States, is a great sin against God and man, for which the nation ought to 

* Published by T. R. Marvin, Boston : 92 pages. This Convention consists of 
both "Orthodox" and Unitarian Congregational ministers, associated for some 
special objects. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 181 

humble itself, and for the speedy and entire removal of which, every Chris- 
tian ought to pray, and use all suitable means within his reach." — Eman. 

The Congregational ministers and churches of Maine, as a 
body, have appeared to be more earnest in their condemna- 
tion of slavery, than those of Massachusetts and Connecticut. 

In 1846, the General Conference adopted a paper expressing their " sur- 
prise and grief" at the then recent action of the General Assembly of the 
Presbyterian Church, which, say they, " appears to be directly at vari- 
ance with the former report made by the General Assembly in 1818, and to 
be intended as a justification of the system of slavery now existing in the 
Southern States." — Chr. Inv., Feb. 1816. 

CONGREGATIONAL PUBLICATIONS. 

Ike Christian Spectator, the organ of the New Haven or New 
School Theology of New England, was earlier in its defence 
of slavery than the Old School Doctors at Princeton, or the 
Professor at Andover. 

I " The Bible contains no explicit prohibition of slavery. It recognizes, 
both in the Old and New Testaments, such a constitution of society, and it 
lends its authority to enforce the mutual obligations resulting from that con- 
stitution. Its language is, ' Slaves, obey your masters, and, masters, give 
unto your slaves that which is just and equal, knowing that ye also have a 
master in heaven.' There is neither chapter nor verse of holy writ which 
lends any countenance to the fulminating spirit of universal emancipation, 
of which some specimens may be seen in some of the newspapers." — New 
Haven Chr. Spectator, Sept., 1832, Vol. II., No. 5, p. 473 ; Gen. Temp., 
April 17, 1833. 

" Domestic slavery, in the light of the Scriptures, and in the light of 
common sense, is justifiable to the same extent, and on exactly the same 
principles with despotism on a larger scale. The right and the wrong of 
both is, materially, perhaps we should say precisely, the same." * * * 
" What is the duty of the Emperor of Russia towards his fifty millions of 
slaves ? Is it his crime that they are his slaves ?" &c, &c. — lb. 

The innocency of "despotism" in general is strange doc* 
trine in America, and among the sons of the Puritans, admit- 
ting, for the sake of the argument, that chattel slavery is no 
worse — which is not true. 

On the vitally important subject of oral instruction for slaves, 
as a substitute for the reading of the scriptures, the Congre- 



182 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

gational press, in New England, to some extent, took 
substantially, the ground of the following extracts. The 
Portland Christian Mirror, if we mistake not, contained some 
suggestions in that direction. 

The Editor of the Yermont Chronicle, (Rev. Joseph Tracy,) 
afterwards Editor of the Boston Recorder, and more recently 
assistant Editor of the N. Y. Observer, wrote of the slaves as 
follows : 

" They have a right to such religious and other instruction as they are 
capable of receiving. When they have profited by that, they will be capable 
of receiving more, and so on, till they become capable of performing the 
duties of freemen and then they will have a right to be free. That they 
have a right to be taught to read, immediately, ive do not say, but their right 
to be taught that which it will be immensely difficult, all but impossible, to 
teach them without reading, is as evident as the sun at noon-day." — Vermont 
Chronicle, vide Emancipator, March 11, 1834. 

" The art of reading, we know, wonderfully increases the facility with 
which we may fit ourselves for the performance of duty, but it is possible to 
become safe citizens without it. We, therefore, pass no sentence, either 

OF CONDEMNATION OB APPROVAL, ON THOSE WHO WITHHOLD THIS ART FROM 

their slaves. We only say they must be educated. You must educate 
them. Take your own ivay to do it. If you find it safe to put books into 
their hands, it will diminish your labor immensely. If not, you must do it, 
nevertheless. The labor of educating them without books will be immense, 
but, books or no books, it must be done, and if books are unsafe instruments, 
you must work the harder." — Sermon of Rev. Joseph Tracy, before the 
Vermont Col. Soc. 

" Capable of receiving!" How long before they will be 
" capable" of learning to read ? What right have one class of 
men to sit in judgment, and decide upon the capabilities of 
another class to receive and study the scriptures? If we may 
" pass no sentence of condemnation" on this assumption in 
America, then we must cease our condemnation of it in Spain 
and Italy. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 183 



CHAPTER XV. 

POSITION OF THE AMERICAN CHURCHES, ETC. CONTINUED. 

IV. — BAPTISTS. 

Charleston (S. C.) Association — Savannah River (Geo.) ditto — Goslein (Va.) ditto — 
Rev. Dr. Furman — Sale of his negroes — Dr. Bolles — "Pleasing union" among 
Am. Baptists — " Southern brethren, generally Slaveholders" — North Carolina 
Association — Baptist Triennial Convention — Board of Foreign Missions — Acting 
Board at Boston — Baptist Home Mission Society — Am. and For. Bible Society — 
Am. Bap. Publication Society. 

Unlike Presbyterians and Methodists, the Baptists are 
subject to no great ecclesiastical body, holding supervision 
over all the Churches and members of the denomination, 
Northern and Southern. The non-slaveholding portion, there- 
fore, of the Baptist sect, at the North, can plead no organic 
difficulties, of an ecclesiastical character, in the way of their 
entire separation from the sin of slaveholding, and their 
untrammeled religious testimony against it. If they receive 
the sin into their pulpits, and seat it at their communion 
tables, it is not because the canons of their church require 
them to submit to such arrangements, nor because any Bishops, 
Conferences, or General Assemblies, have imposed the burthen 
upon them. The bond of affinity and sympathy between 
Baptist slaveholders and Baptist Anti-Slavery men, if it exists 
at all, exists voluntarily, and not by compulsion — exists as a 
veritable reality and not as a mere matter of appearance and 
form. 

That Southern Baptists, like Southern Methodists, Presby- 
terians, and Episcopalians, are commonly slaveholders (except 
those of them who are slaves,) we need not spend time to 



18-i GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

prove, as it will not be denied. A few facts will show the 
general position of Southern Baptists, on the subject. 

In 1835, the Charleston Baptist Association addressed a 
memorial to the Legislature of South Carolina, in defence of 
slavery. They say : 

" The said Association does not consider that the holy scriptures have 
made the fact of slavery a question of morals at all. The Divine Author of 
our holy religion, in particular, found slavery a part of the existing 
institutions of society, with which, if not sinful, it was not his design to 
intermeddle, but to leave them entirely to the control of men. Adopting it, 
therefore, as one of the allowed relations of Society, he made it the province 
of his religion only to prescribe the reciprocal duties of the relation. The 
question it is believed is purely one of political economy, &c." 

As it is here assumed that Christ and Christianity do not 
" intermeddle" with questions of mere " political economy," 
and as slavery is affirmed to be purely such a question, and not 
a question of morals, it might be inquired why an ecclesiastical 
body should depart from what it alleged to be Christ's example, 
by "intermeddling" with this purely political subject? The 
''Association" proceeded to affirm their right to hold slaves, 
and to say : 

" Neither society nor individuals, have any more authority to demand a 
relinquishment without an equivalent, in the one case than in the other," 
(that is, their right to) " the money and lands inherited from ancestors or 
derived from industry.'''' 

The Association then claims for the State of S. Carolina, 
the exclusive right " to regulate the existence and continu- 
ance of slavery within her territorial limits," and they 
add : 

"We would resist, to the utmost, every invasion of THIS RIGHT, 
come from what quarter and under whatever pretense it may. 1 ' 

The object, then, of this ecclesiastical memorial to the 
State Legislature, was to affirm the inherent right of slave- 
holding, on the same basis of the rights of property in "money 
and lands," to invoke or encourage a continued legislative 
protection of this supposed right, and to pledge The Charles- 



1 1 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 185 

ton Baptist Association, to the support of this legislative action, 
even to the point of resistance to the utmost 

Sad business for the professed disciples of him who came 
to proclaim the jubilee of deliverance to the captives! 

IIow Baptist slaveholders understand the tenure of their 
assumed rights of property in man, and at what expense they 
expect those rights to be maintained by their State Legislatures, 
may be learned from the following : 

In 1835 the following query, relating to slaves, was pre- 
sented to the Savannah River Baptist Association of ministers : 

" Whether, in case of involuntary separation of such a character as to 
preclude all future intercourse, the parties may be allowed to marry again ?" 

ANSWER. 

" That such separation among persons situated as our slaves are, is civilly 
a separation by death, and they believe that, in the sight of God, it would 
be so viewed. To forbid second marriages in such cases, would be to 
expose the parties not only to greater hardships and stronger temptations, 
but to church censure for acting in obedience to their masters, who cannot 
be expected to acquiesce in a regulation at variance with justice to the 
slaves, and to the spirit of that command which regulates marriage between 
Christians. The slaves are not free agents, and a dissolution by death is 
not more entirely without their consent and beyond their control than by 
such separation." 

Incidentally here, the fact leaks out that slave cohabitation 
is enforced by the authority of the masters, for the increase 
of their human chattels, and that this is done in utter con- 
tempt of the divine institution of marriage. And a body of 
devout ecclesiastics gravely decide that inasmuch as this pro- 
cess, in connection with the frequent and forced separation 
from each other of wives and husbands belonging to Baptist 
churches, is inseparable from the slave system, the divine in- 
stitution of marriage, as expounded by Christ, must be modi- 
fied in conformity with the slave code, in order that those 
whom God hath joined together, may, by man, be put asun- 
der, s£> that Baptist wives may have two husbands and Baptist 
husbands may have two wives, without being subjected to 
" church censure ." j 

The " censufi^of such churches, verily, must be of vast 



186 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

benefit in rebuking the sin of adultery ! If any testimony 
were wanted, to establish the fact that slavery is incompatible 
with marriage, the Savannah River Baptist Association have 
furnished it to our hands. 

In the same year, 1835, the ministers and messengers of 
the Goslein Baptist Association, assembled at Free Union, 
Virginia, adopted resolutions, affirming their right to slave 
property. 

In 1833, Rev. Dr. Furman addressed to the Governor 
of South Carolina an exposition of the views of Baptists, in 
which he said : 

" The right of holding slaves is clearly established in the Holy Scrip- 
tures, both by precept and example." 

" Dr. Furman died not long afterward. His legal representatives thus 
advertised his property for sale : 

" ' NOTICE. 

" ' On the first day of February next will be put up at public auction, 
before the Court-house, the following property, belonging to the estate of 
the late Rev. Dr. Furman, viz. : 

" ' A plantation or tract of land on and in Wateree Swamp ; a tract of 
the first quality of fine land on the waters of Black River ; a lot of land in 
the town of Camden ; a library of a miscellaneous character, chiefly 

THEOLOGICAL ; 

27 NEGROES, 
some of them very prime ; two mules, one horse, and an old wagon.' " 

This is Baptist religion at the South. And what is it at 
the North? 

" The late Rev. Lucius Bolles, D.D., of Massachusetts, Cor. Sec. Amer. 
Bap. Board for Foreign Missions, in 1834, said : 

" ' There is a pleasing degree of union among the multiplying thousands 
of Baptists throughout the land.' * * * * * ' Our Southern brethren 
are generally, both ministers and people, slaveholders.' " — American 
Churches, &c. 

The great majority of northern Baptists endorse this state- 
ment and certify the essential identity of their religion with 
that of Southern Baptists, by joining with them in sending 
THEIR religion . . . to the heathen. 

The North Carolina Baptist Convention, in 1838 or 1839, 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 187 

adopted a report of a Committee on the religious instruction 
of people of color. After urging, in a series of Eesolutions, 
the duty of instructing slaves, they close with the following: 

" Resolved, That by religious instruction be understood, VERBAL com- 
munications on religious subjects." — Vide Cincinnati Cross and Baptist 
Journal, as quoted in A. <S. Lecturer, No. 3. 

Thus careful were they to be understood as not intending 
to recommend giving slaves the Bible and permitting them to 
read. 

THE BAPTIST TRIENNIAL CONVENTION. 

This body was organized in 1814. 

" Under its constitution, slaveholders and non-slaveholders united on 
terms of social and moral equality. This was its fatal error. It caused 
the Convention, from its birth to its dissolution, to sanction as Christian a 
slaveholding religion." "The first President was Richard Furman, a 
slaveholder of South Carolina. He filled the office till 1820, when another 
slaveholder, Robert B. Semple, of Virginia, succeeded him, and was Pre- 
sident till 1832, when Spencer H. Cone,* of New York (City) was elected, 
who held the office till 1841, when another slaveholder, William B. John- 
son, of South Carolina, was elected, at the close of whose term of office, 
1844, Francis Wayland became President. Thus, for twenty-one of the 
thirty years of this organization, slaveholders were its Presidents." — Facts 
for Bap. Churches, pp. 14, 15. 

Connected with the Triennial Convention was a General 
Board of Baptist Foreign Missions ; and subordinate to this 
was an "Acting Board," located in Boston. 

So late as 1844, near the time of the dissolution of that 
body, it came to light that there was a slaveholding mis- 
sionary in its employ, a Mr. Bushy head, who was laboring 
among the Cherokees. He lived in a fine dwelling, had a 
plantation, and several slaves. — lb. p. 102. 

It also appeared, not long after, that there Avere several 
southern missionaries employed by the Board, and that, among 
these, Mr. Davenport and his wife, at Siam, were slaveholders. 

* In 1S23 or 1824, Mr. Cone was pastor of a slaveholding Baptist Church in Alex- 
andria (D. C.) 



188 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

This was stated, on authority of the " Christian Index," (a 
Southern Baptist paper) by the New York Baptist Register, 
of Utica, N. Y., April 6, 1845.— lb. p. 113-17. 

It was also stated, on good authority, that several others 
among the foreign missionaries were slaveholders. — lb. p. 
122-3. 

"THE AMERICAN BAPTIST HOME MISSION SOCIETY 

was organized in the City of New York, April 27, 1832." 
"Missionary Societies" (northern and southern) "by paying 
into its treasury their surplus funds, become auxiliary." Its 
constitution makes no distinction between slaveholders and 
non-slaveholders. " The Society has elected slaveholding 
officers, sent out slaveholding missionaries, and planted slave- 
holding churches, and all this in perfect keeping with its Con- 
stitution. Slaveholders are, to-day, (1850) on its list of life 
members, and its treasury is open to the price of men and 
women and little children." "As the Missionary of this 
Society, (Mr. Tryon,) entered Texas, he drove his slaves be- 
fore him."— lb. p. 63-65. 

It was publicly stated, at a meeting in Philadelphia, by 
Eld. Duncan Dunbar, that twenty-six slaveholders had been em- 
ployed by the Board. — lb. p. 65. 

The subject of employing slaveholding Missionaries came 
up for consideration, at its twelfth annual meeting, at Phila- 
delphia, in 1844, but, after discussion, no action was taken 
against it. Instead of this, a Resolution (drawn up by Eld. 
R. Fuller, a slaveholder of South Carolina, and a Biblical de- 
fender of slavery,) was adopted, assuming neutral ground, 
and disclaiming fellowship, as a Society, either with slavery 
or anti-slavery. At this meeting, Eld. B. M. Hill, Corres- 
ponding Secretary of the Society, stated that the Southern 
States paid more into the treasury than the Northern States, 
and therefore more southern missionaries were appointed than 
northern ones. — lb. p. 88-90. 

At the meeting of the Society at Providence, R, I., April, 
1845, some further discussion was had, and some incipient 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 189 

measures for a division between the North and the South 
were considered, and a committee appointed to mature a plan. 
Assurances were given that, in the meantime, no more slave- 
holding missionaries should be appointed. But the promise 
was violated. " Two slavcholding missionaries had been 
appointed in February, and one of them was appointed again 
the next year, after the fact of his slaveholding had been 
published in the Minutes of the Baptist Convention of North 
Carolina, as a proof that the Home Missionary Society was 
willing to employ slaveholders, and as an evidence that no 
rule had been adopted at Providence prohibiting the appoint- 
ment of slaveholders."— lb. 149-162. 

THE AMERICAN AND FOREIGN BIBLE SOCIETY, 

(Baptist) was organized in 1837, the year of the martyrdom 
of Lovejoy, and after the murderous spirit of slaveholding 
ministers and church members against northern abolitionists 
had been fully revealed. It was a fraternal union between 
the leading ministers and the great majority of the lay brother- 
hood of Baptists, at the North and at the South. It had, in 
18-41, fifty-eight auxiliary societies in the slaveholding states. 
It has never been without slaveholding officers. — lb. p. 58-9. 

The (Baptist) "Christian Index," Georgia, of November 
16, 1848, contained an appeal in behalf of this Bible Society, 
and also an advertisement, in which " a plantation with some 
twenty negroes, stock of every kind," &c, were offered for 
sale.— lb. p. 323-4. 

At a meeting of this Society, it was " Eesolved to furnish 
every family in the United States with a Bible." 

Eld. Abel Brown immediately rose and inquired, mildly, 
whether the resolution embraced slaves ? Scarcely had the 
words escaped his lips, when the house resounded with the 
cry of " Order ! order ! order !" and the President, Eld. Spen- 
cer H. Cone, with emphatic voice and gesture, called out to 
him, — " Sit down, Sir ! you are out of order." — lb. 327. 

The Society has never published its intention of giving the 
Bible to the poor heathen in the slave states, though it is be- 



190 - GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

lieved that money has been repeatedly offered to the Society 
for the object, and that they have, invariably, refused to re- 
ceive it.— lb. 327-8. 

And yet, in a communication to the committee of the (Eng- 
lish) General Baptist Missionary Society, the Board of the 
American and Foreign Bible Society, Nov. 3, 1847, over the 
signature of Eld. Spencer H. Cone, said, of the Society, — 

" They have never withheld the Bible from the slave." And they fur- 
ther say they have reason tor believe that " the colored race, bond and free," 
receive a fair proportion of their books ! 

Of the credibility of these statements, the American -reader 
can judge.— lb. 325-334. 

The Board further says: "We have never designed, nor 
are we conscious that we have done aught to abet the system 
or practice of slavery." Yet the Society (1849) receives slave- 
holders to membership, has 59 auxiliaries, 506 life members, 
99 life directors, and 9 Vice Presidents, in the slave states.— 
lb. p. 333-4.' 

"THE AMERICAN BAPTIST PUBLICATION SOCIETY," 

is also " a bond of union between the North and the South," 
publishing nothing againt slavery. — lb. p. 340-44. 

A further account of the position of Baptist organizations 
in respect to slavery, will appear in another chapter, as con- 
nected with the movements of abolitionists, and Baptist " Free 
Missions." 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 191 



CHAPTER XVI. 

POSITION OF THE AMERICAN CHURCHES, ETC., CONTINUED. 
V. THE PROTESTANT EPISCOPAL CHURCH. 

Testimony of John Jay, Esq.— Sermon of Mr. Freeman— Bishop Ives— Protestant 
Episcopal Society of South Carolina— Bishop Bo-wen—" The Churchman"— Pro- 
hibition of reading— General Theological Seminary— Treatment of a Colored 
student, Alexander Crummel— Position of Rev. Drs. Milnor, Taylor, Smith, and 
Hawks — Dissent of Bishop Doane — Exclusion of Colored Ministers from Eccle- 
siastical Councils — Episcopal Convention at Philadelphia — St. Thomas' Church. 

The prevailing temper of the Protestant Episcopal Church 
is thus testified of, by John Jay, Esq., of the City of New 
York — himself an Episcopalian — in a pamphlet entitled, 
" Thoughts on the Duty of the Episcopal Church, in relation 
to Slavery." 

" Alas ! for the expectation that she would conform to the spirit of her 
ancient mother ! She has not merely remained a mute and careless spec- 
tator of this great conflict of truth and justice with hypocrisy and cruelty, 
but her very priests and deacons may be seen ministering at the altar of 
slavery, offering their talents and influence at its unholy shrine, and openly 
repeating the awful blasphemy, that the precepts of our Saviour sanction 
the system of American slavery. Her Northern (free State) clergy, with 
rare exceptions, whatever they may feel on the subject, rebuke it neither 
in public nor in private, and her periodicals, far from advancing the pro- 
gress of abolition, at times oppose our societies, impliedly defending slavery, 
as not incompatible with Christianity, and occasionally withholding informa- 
tion useful to the cause of freedom. 5 ' — Birney^s American Churches, &c, 
pp. 39, 40. ) 

" In 1836, a Clergyman of North Carolina, of the name of Freeman, 
preached, in presence of his bishop (Rev.- Levi S. Ives, D.D., a native of a 
free State), two sermons on the rights and duties of slaveholders. In these 



192 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

he essayed to justify, from the Bible, the slavery of both white men and 
negroes, and insisted that, ' without a new revelation from heaven, no man 
was authorized to pronounce slavery ivrong.'' The two sermons were 
printed in a pamphlet, prefaced with a letter to Mr. Freeman from the 
Bishop of North Carolina, declaring that he had ' listened with most un- 
feigned pleasure' to his discourses, and advised their publication, as being 
' urgently called for at the present time.' 

" The Protestant Episcopal Society for the Advancement of Christianity 
in South Carolina thought it expedient, and, in all likelihood, with Bishop 
Bowen's approbation, to republish Mr. Freeman's pamphlet as a religious 
tract !"—Ib., p. 41. 

The Churchman, edited by a Doctor of Divinity, and pre- 
viously an instructor in a theological seminary, held the fol- 
lowing language, in respect to the legal prohibition of teaching 
the colored population to read : 

" All the knowledge which is necessary to salvation — all the knowledge 
of our duty towards God, and our duty to our neighbor, may be communi- 
cated by oral instruction, and therefore a law of the land interdicting other 
means of instruction, does not trench upon the law of God." — lb. 

This argument would justify the Romish Church in with- 
holding the Bible from the laity. And by the same kind of 
logic it might be argued, with much greater force, that, since 
"the holy scriptures are able to make men wise unto salva- 
tion," therefore, in a community that can read and that has 
Bibles, " a law of the land interdicting other means of instruc- 
tion" (oral instruction by preaching) "does not trench upon 
the law of God." If the civil or ecclesiastical authorities may 
interdict some means of religious instruction they may inter- 
dict others. If they may interdict the Bible, they may, doubt- 
less, interdict the " Book of Common Pra} T er" and all the forms 
of instruction, including the rituals of the Episcopal or any 
other church. To such results do those drive their arguments 
who would defend the usages of slavery. The employment 
of such arguments certifies what those usages are, and that the 
slave code is not a dead letter. The quarter they come from 
indicates the relative position, in respect to them, of the Church 
and the State. If the prevailing religion of the country did 
not sanction them, they could not be protected by the State 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 193 

laws ; nay, such enactments would not have been made. No 
civil government, however despotic, can "interdict" the stand- 
ard books of the prevailing and predominant religion, and sur- 
vive the process. Whenever the prevailing religion of the 
country shall be the religion of the Bible, in which is contained 
the divine injunction, " Search the Scriptures" the laws and the 
usages " interdicting" the same Scriptures will, of course, be- 
come obsolete, and the slave system, which can be supported 
only by such interdiction, will fall. 

Alexander Crummel, a colored young gentleman of the 
city of New York, made application to " become a candidate 
for holy orders." He received from his bishop the usual cir- 
cular in such cases, in which he was encouraged to "belong 
to the General Theological Seminary," located at New York. 
In the statutes of the Seminary it is expressly said, " Every 
person producing to the Faculty satisfactory evidence of his 
having been admitted a candidate for holy orders," &c., " shall 
be received as a student of the Seminary." He was, however, 
referred to the Board of Trustees. A committee was appointed 
to consider and report, consisting of Bishop Doane, Eev. Drs. 
Milnor, Taylor, and Smith, and Messrs. D. B. Ogdeu, New- 
ton, and Johnson. The next day (June 26, 1839), Bishop 
Doane, on request, was excused from further service on this 
committee, and Bishop Onderdonk, of Pennsylvania, appointed 
to fill the vacancy. This committee reported, June 27th, that 
" having deliberately considered the said petition, they are of 
opinion that it ought not to be granted" and they recommended 
a resolution accordingly, which, on motion of Rev. Dr. Hawks, 
was adopted. Mr. Huntington moved that the subject be 
referred to the Faculty, which was lost. Bishop Doane, June 
28th, asked leave to state to the Board his reasons for dissent, 
with a view to the entering of the same on the minutes. Leave 
was not granted. During these proceedings Mr. Crummel was 
advised by the Bishop of New York to withdraw his petition, 
and was assured that the Faculty were willing to impart to 
him private instruction. In the minutes of the proceedings 
there was a careful avoidance of all allusion to the cause of 

13 



194 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

excluding Mr. Crummel, leaving it to be inferred that it was 
for some cause besides bis color, which was not the fact. Mr. 
Crummel afterwards became a member of the Theological 
department of Yale College, but not being treated there as 
white students are, he was compelled to complete his educa- 
tion in Europe ! He is noiv an ordained clergyman of the 
American Protestant Episcopal Church. ) 

Regularly ordained ministers and rectors of parishes have 
been excluded from seats in the ecclesiastical councils of their 
church, solely on account of their color. " The rector of a 
colored church in Philadelphia is excluded by an express 
canon of the Diocesan Convention." — Vide J. O. Birney's Am. 
Churches, pp. 39-41. 

Quite recently, the Episcopal Convention of Pennsylvania, 
sitting in Philadelphia, after discussion, decided against the 
admission of colored delegates. 

We learn from the Saturday Evening Post, that at the late Episcopal 
Convention, a final decision was made upon the question of admitting repre- 
sentatives from the African Church of St. Thomas. 

The majority of the committee appointed to consider the subject, reported 
adversely to the admission, arguing that the color, and physical and social 
condition and education of the blacks, render them unfit to participate in 
legislative bodies. The Rev. Mr. Montgomery submitted a minority report, 
which stated that, in the month of September, 1794, Bishop White laid 
before the Convention the Constitution of St. Thomas's Church, and it was 
then resolved, that as soon as they should sign the Act of Association, 
they should be entitled to all the privileges of the Diocese. It also 
urged that the exclusion of delegates on account of their color, was con- 
trary to the spirit of Christianity, and the practice of the church in apostolic 
times. 

After a short discussion, the vote was taken upon adopting the report of 
the majority, which was decided as follows : Clerical, ayes 44, nays 42. 
Lay votes, by churches, ayes 50, nays 17. So it was resolved that the 
delegates from St. Thomas' Church should not be admitted to seats in the 
Convention ! ! — Liberator, June 28, 1850. 

The large number of nays, in the clerical vote, deserves 
notice, as an encouraging indication, and as contrasting 
strongly and remarkably with the vote of the laity. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 195 



CHAPTER XVII. 

POSITION OF THE AMERICAN CHURCHES, ETC. (CONTINUED.) 

VI. — OTHER SECTS — GENERAL VIEW. 

Protestant Methodist Church — Dutch Reformed — Roman Catholics — Unitarians, Uni- 
versalists and Restorationists — Free Will Baptists — Cumberland Presbyterians — 
Orthodox and Hicksite Friends — Scotch Covenanters — General View. Testimony 
of Rev. James Smylie, of Mississippi — S. W. Chr. Ads-. &, Journal — Presb. Synod, 
Kentucky — Rev. C. C. Jones, of Georgia. 

We have now spoken of the principal religious denomina- 
tions in America. The reader has already noticed our cheer- 
ful recognition of the fact that in all of them there are earnest 
friends of the slaves. Of some of the smaller sects, it cannot 
be said that their position essentially differs from the preced- 
ing, though smaller and younger sects are commonly more 
free than larger ones. 

The Protestant Methodist Church (which rejects Epis- 
copacy) has a Southern as well as a Northern membership,, 
and allows slaveholding. After some agitation in their Gen- 
eral Conference, and some signs of a Northern secession in 
Western New York, a General Conference at Cincinnati 
declined any anti-slavery action, the Northern Conferences 
did not secede, and there has been little or no agitation since. 

The Dutch Reformed Church is not known to differ in 
respect to slavery from northern Congregationalists and Pres- 
byterians with which sects it co-operates in the enterprise of 
Foreign Missions. 

There are some advocates of emancipation among the 
Roman Catholics, but it is not known that the number is 



196 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

large, or that the question of slavery, or of the treatment of 
the colored people, has been agitated in that communion. 
The Catholics in the Slave States are as generally slavehold- 
ers as others. 

Unitarians, Universalists, and Eestorationists, whose 
church polity is generally Congregational, were not included 
in our account of the Congregational sect. We cannot say 
that they differ widely from other sects at the North, though 
they have little or no direct ecclesiastical connections or 
branches at the South. They are divided on the abolition 
question, as other sects are. 

A large, though select number of Unitarian ministers, 
signed, some time since, an extended document against sla- 
very, but not taking, it is believed, higher ground than the 
"orthodox" General Association of Massachusetts and Gene- 
ral Conference of Maine had taken several years before. 
Whether the document is better honored by them, in prac- 
tice, as a general fact, we cannot tell. ISTor can we conjecture 
how anti-slavery resolutions would be disposed of in their 
regularly constituted Associations, if it were their habit to 
bear testimonies in that way. We have heard of no thorough 
anti-slavery churches of that sect, or of the withdrawal of 
ministers and laymen for re-organization, on account of the 
slave question, though there are earnest and active abolition- 
ists among them, and of the radical type not approved by the 
late Dr. Channing. 

The statements made in the last sentence may, perhaps, 
apply to Universalists and Eestorationists. A large, if not a 
general Association of Universalists, some time since, 
adopted a general testimony against slavery. 

Of all these, as sects, we must however say, that the weight 
of their influence, especially at the ballot-box, as in the case 
of the larger sects, is not against slavery, but in its support. 

And we cannot here, and in this particular, make an excep- 
tion in favor of some other sects, as the "Orthodox " and the 
"Hicksite" Friends, and the Free-Will Baptists, who 
claim the merit of being opposed to slavery, and whose printed 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 197 

" testimonies " to that effect have not been wanting.* To say 
nothing now of their general treatment of active abolitionists 
belonging to their own sect (a topic of which we are not 
directly speaking in this chapter), the general influence of 
even these sects, or of a majority of their members, especially 
at the ballot-box, has been, and still is, on the side of the 
slave power, in voting for slaveholders and their supporters. 

The majority of "Friends," of both classes, have not only 
voted for slaveholding candidates for the Presidency, but, in 
the case of the late General Taylor, for a candidate whose 
sudden and surprising popularity (first at the South, and then 
at the North) was owing wholly to the terrible success (some- 
times by the aid of bloodhounds) with which he prosecuted 
aggressive pro-slavery wars, in further contempt of the pro- 
fessed principles of Friends. 

If such be the position of what have been called the anti- 
slavery sects, by way of distinction, what must be the position 
of the others ? Who can marvel that, in the case just adverted 
to, the preponderating influence of Presbyterian and Congre- 
gational ministers should have been cast into the same scale 
with the Friends ? And what can be said in excuse of such 
a course, when an united rally at the polls, by professed 
Christians of all sects, even in the free States alone, in oppo- 
sition to the slave power, would so manifestly and so speedily 
terminate its iron and bloody sway? 

In due justice to Free-Will Baptists, it should be further 
said, that their periodical publications and ecclesiastical bodies 
have generally, if not uniformly, taken anti-slavery ground, 
from the beginning of the agitation on the subject. And at 
an early day they separated themselves (the Northern and 
principal portion of them) from a considerable body of South- 
ern Free- Will Baptists, who refused to relinquish slavehold- 

* It is possible for a sect or religious body, in its public or corporate character, and 
by its official and formal declarations and proceedings, to maintain a strong testi- 
mony against slavery, and even (as in the case of the Free-Will Baptists and 
Friends) to withdraw religious fellowship from slaveholders ; while the great body 
of its members and officers, for political ends, sustain slavery at the polls. 



198 GEE AT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

ing. Their testimony, on the whole, is perhaps not behind 
that of the ' ; Friends." 

The Scotch Covenanters, or Associate Eeformed Pres- 
byterian Church, is anti-slavery, and having scruples (on 
other grounds) that deter them from voting at all under our 
government, they are free from pro-slavery voting. 

The Cumberland Presbyterians have sometimes been 
described as anti-slavery, but their " General Assembly refuse 
to legislate on the subject of slavery, on the plea that, as spir- 
itual bodies, they have no cognizance of civil matters." — An. 
Report Am. & For. A. S. Soc., 1852, p. 19. 

"The Disciples" — sometimes called Campbellites (from 
their founder, Alexander Campbell) — are numerous at the 
West and South. They are slaveholders and slaves. Pres. 
Shannon, of Bacon College, a prominent member of the sect, 
says: 

k ' Thus did Jehovah stereotype his approbation of domestic slavery, by 
incorporating it into the Jewish religion, the only religion on earth that had 
the divine sanction." 

Alexander Campbell himself, in his "Millennial Harbinger" 

says: 

" There is not one verse in the Bible inhibiting it, but many regulating 
it. It is not, then, we conclude, immoral." — Pillsbury''s " Church as it is," 
pp. 52-3. 

Of the anti-slavery churches, sects, ecclesiastical bodies, 
and missionary organizations that have grown out of the 
abolition movement, and which are controlled by abolition- 
ists, we shall give some account in another connection. 

general view. 

The record we have presented looks in the direction of a 
general estimate of the religious influences of the country on 
the slave question. And it indicates the position of the pro- 
fessed Christianity of the North, as represented by the differ- 
ent sects. If there be any further inquiry needed respecting 
the system that is thus sustained, or whether, in the hands of 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 199 

professing Christians of the different sects at the South, it be 
the thing that its opposers represent it to be, a few testimonies 
may satisfy the inquirer. 

" The Rev. James Smylie, A.M., of the Amite Presbytery, Mississippi, 
in a pamphlet published by him" (about fifteen years ago), " in favor of 
American slavery, says : 

"If slavery be a sin, and advertising and apprehending slaves, with a 
view to restore them to their masters, is a direct violation of the divine law, 
and if the buying, selling, and holding a slave FOR THE SAKE OF 
GAIN, is a heinous sin and scandal, then verily, three-fourths of all the 
Episcopalians, Methodists, Baptists, and Presbyterians, in eleven States of 
the Union, are of the devil. They hold, if they do not buy and sell slaves, 
and, (with few exceptions,) they hesitate not to apprehend and restore run- 
away slaves, when in their power." 

The Editor of South West Christian Advocate and Journal, 
a periodical of the Methodist Episcopal Church, corroborates 
this general statement, so far as that Church is concerned, as 
follows : 

" If, however, the holding of men, women, and children, in bondage, 
under the ordinary circumstances that connect themselves with slavery 
in the Southern States, constitutes us a pro-slavery Church, then we aro 
a pro-slavery Church in this restricted or privately understood interpretation, 
for we do not regard slaveholding as sinful, as it exists in the Southern 
States, provided the master feeds, instructs, and governs his slaves, 
according to the directions laid down in God's word." 

By the testimony of the Presbyterian Synod of Kentucky, 
of Kev. C. C. Jones of Georgia, and also of the Synod of S. 
Carolina and Georgia, the fact is established that slaveholding 
church members in general do not give their slaves any more 
religious instruction than other slaveholders do, which, in most 
cases is none at all, so that the slaves — to use their own lan- 
guage; — are in the condition of heathenism. 

Putting these things together, we have a complete and full 
refutation of the pretence that Christian slaveholders hold 
slaves for their own good, that they make a wide distinction 
between slavetrading and slaveholding, and that they treat 
their slaves better than they are generally treated by others. 



200 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

Any amount of testimony might be added, to the same 
point. We only advert to the topic, in this place, to exhibit, 
as clearly as we can, in one view, the relation of our religious 
sects, in America in general, to the condition and treatment 
of the slaves, and to slaveholding. 

PREJUDICE AGAINST COLOR. 

That prejudice against the colored people, which constitutes 
one of the main pillars of slavery, is fostered in most of the 
Churches, including some that — in other respects — bear testi- 
mony against the system. Their support of the Colonization 
Society (as will be shown in its place,) is a sufficient indication 
of the fact. Another evidence is the erection of the negro pew, 
and, in some Churches, the custom of administering the Lord's 
Supper to colored persons, by themselves, after the distribu- 
tion to the whites. In Theological Seminaries, as well as in 
Colleges, the same spirit of caste is commonly witnessed. In 
some cases, it invades the sanctuary of the dead, and forbids 
the interment of colored persons in burial places designed for 
the whites. 

A Protestant Episcopal Church at Eye, Westchester Co., 
(N. Y.,) accepted a deed of gift of ground for a cemetery, a 
condition of which deed was, that no colored person should be 
buried within the enclosures. The condition is carefully 
fulfilled. In selling burial lots to individuals, the officials of 
the Church having charge of that business, insert the same 
conditions in the conveyance. This fact is stated on authority 
of Hon. William Jay, a member of the Protestant Episcopal 
Church, and residing in the same county. 

A Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia advertised burial- 
lots for sale, with the particular recommendation of them, that 
no colored persons, or executed criminals, were buried in the 
cemetery. 

A Congregational Church in New Haven, Con., parcelled 
off, in its cemetery, a side lot, for the burial of colored persons, 
after the manner of the negro pew. But it became necessary 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 201 

to enlarge the cemetery, and bury whites on the other side of 
the colored people, so that they now occupy the center ! An 
omen, perhaps, of the future position of that despised race, in 
America. 

To the credit of Eoman Catholics, it must be said, that they 
maintain no arrangements of caste founded in color, in their 
Churches. 



202 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

POSITION OF THE AMERICAN CHURCHES, ETC. CONTINUED. 

VII. — VOLUNTARY SOCIETIES CONNECTED WITH SEVERAL SECTS. 
CONCLUDING REMARKS. 

American Board— Employment of Slaves by Missionaries— A Missionary a slave- 
owner— Slaveholding tolerated in Mission Churches— Board, at Rochester, decline 
interfering (1844)— At Brooklyn, 1845, decide against excluding pious Slaveholders 
from Church ordinances— In 1846, at New Haven, decline further action— In 1847, 
at Buffalo, promise inquiry— Mission and Letter of Mr. Treat— Reply of Choctaw 
Missionaries— Vindicate their right to have slaves— Rejected resolutions of Dr. 
Bacon, at Brooklyn (1845)— Doctrine of "organic sins."— American Home Mis- 
sionary Society — No rule to exclude Slaveholders from Mission Churches— Has 
greatly increased the list of its slaveholding Churches since 1842— Other agencies. 
—American Bible Society— No Bibles for Slaves— Offer of funds for that object 
rejected — Auxiliary Society at New Orleans disclaimed the intent to supply 
colored people— Auxiliary Society, Orleans County, N. Y., refused a donation of 
Bibles to fugitives— Modified but doubtful position of the Parent Society in 1849. 
—American Tract Society— Publishes nothing against Slavery— Mutilation of 
b 00 ]j 8 . — American Sunday School Union— Rejects books that disapprove 
slavery — Closing remarks. 

MISSIONS — AMERICAN BOARD. 

The following statements are from a paper, adopted by the 
Illinois Central Association, and prepared by a committee, 
consisting of Pres. Blanchard, Rev. D. Gore, and G. Dewy, at 
Lafayette, October 9th, 1849* : 

"The action which the Board has taken from year to year, on the subject 
of slavery, is as follows, viz : 

" 1. Some thirteen years since, the Prudential Committee, in correspond- 
ence on the subject, declared against the missionaries hiring slaves, except 
in cases of emergency. 



* National Era, Nov. 8, 1849. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 203 

"2. In 1841, eight years ago, at Philadelphia, the subject came before 
the Board on petition of certain ministers of New Hampshire, who represent 
themselves as supporters of the Board, not Abolitionists, yet opposed to 
slavery ; and they ask the Board to declare itself distinctly on that subject, 
as they had done on the subject of other public vices which obstructed the 
missionary work. To this New Hampshire petition, the Board, by their 
committee's report, adopted, reply that : 

" ' The Board can sustain no relation to slavery which implies approba- 
tion of the system, and, as a Board, can have no connection or sympathy 
with it.' 

" At that time, however, slaves were employed in the service of the 
mission-schools, the owners being paid for their service, and slaveholders 
were without objection received to the mission churches ; both which 
practices have continued ever since, and still continue. One of their 
missionaries, too, was at that time a slave owner — the Rev. Mr. Wilson, of 
Africa. 

"In 1840, at Norwich, Connecticut, several 'memorials and other papers 
on the subject of slavery' were read by Mr. Greene, and referred. The 
Board, in their answer, say, 'They cannot but hope that he (Mr. Wilson) 
will ere long be able, with such counsel and aid as the Prudential Com- 
mittee may give, to accomplish the object (the liberation of his slaves) in a 
manner satisfactory to himself, and kind and beneficent to them (*. e., his 
slaves).' 

"In 1843, at Rochester, New York, one memorial on slavery was read 
by Mr. Greene, and the Board refer, for answer, to their former action ou 
the subject. 

" In 1844, at a very large meeting of the Board at Worcester, Massa- 
chusetts, memorials on the subject of slavery were committed to Drs. 
Woods and Tyler, Chancellor Walworth, Chief Justice Williams, Drs. 
Stowe, Sandford, Pomroy, Tappan, McLane, and Secretary Greene. 

"The memorials this year set forth that slavery is ' actually tolerated'' 
in the Mission Churches among the Choctaws, ' by the admission of slave- 
holders as members,' to the hindering of the missionary work, and dimin- 
ishing the funds of the Board. In their answer, which was adopted by the 
Board, the committee reiterate the words of the Philadelphia report, three 
years before, ' That the Board can sustain no relation to slavery which im- 
plies approbation of the system,' &c. But they add, as explaining that 
clause, ' plainly intimating that we consider it an obvious evil, the removal 
of which does not fall within the province of the Board.' 

" They ask further time to obtain information as to slavery in the Choc- 
taw mission churches, but observe, meantime, that missionaries there, so 
far as facts appear, have been guilty of ' no violation or neglect of duty.' 

" In 1845, the Board met at Brooklyn, New York, and much discussion 



204 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

was elicited by a long report from the above committee, which report, with 
proposed amendments, was re-committed, reported again, and finally unani- 
mously adopted. This celehrated Brooklyn report declares, among other 
things, that in the Cherokee and Choctaw missions, 'both masters and 
slaves were received into the churches on the same principles.' 

" ' That Baptism and the Lord's Supper cannot be scripturally and right- 
fully denied to those who give credible evidence of piety;' and that, 

" ' The missionaries, in connection with the churches which they have 
gathered, are the sole judges of the sufficiency of this evidence.' 

" The committee further report, that at that time there were in the Choc- 
taw churches 20 slaveholders and 131 slaves. In the Cherokee churches, 
15 slaveholders and 21 slaves. Total, 35 slaveholders and 152 slaves, in 
a total membership of 843. And this Brooklyn report further explicitly 
recognizes the doctrine that both ' master and slave may be gathered into 
the fold of Christ,' and intimates that this is the way to prepare the master 
to consent to emancipation. 

" In 1846, at New Haven, Connecticut, papers on the subject of slavery 
were laid before the Board, from the General Congregational Association 
of Illinois, New Haven East Association, and other bodies. They were 
referred to a committee, consisting of Chancellor Walworth, Drs. Parker. 
Stowe, and others, and they reported : 

" ' That they consider the further agitation of the subject here as calcu- 
lated injuriously to affect the great cause of missions in which the Board is 
engaged.' 

" Up to this time, the doctrines on which the Board stands respecting 
slavery are : 

" 1. That slavery, though an admitted evil, is one which the Board is not 
responsible for removing ; and 

" 2. That masters and slaves are to be received into fellowship in the 
churches, giving evidence of piety ; and 

"3. That the missionaries and churches among the Choctaws are the 
only judges of the credibility of that evidence. 

" In 1847, the Board met at Buffalo, New York, when an honorary mem- 
ber of the Board moved that a committee be appointed to inquire whether 
any further action was required in reference to slavery among the Choctaws 
and Cherokees. The Secretaries replied, that 'they had every possible 
disposition to remove slavery and every other evil and sin as speedily as 
possible from the mission churches,' and that one of their number would 
visit the missions in question, and the whole subject of their slavery rela- 
tions would come up on his report the following year. 

" Mr. Secretary Treat accordingly visited those Indian missions, and the 
result of his visit, his report, and the correspondence connected with it, are 
before the public. The material facts shown by his report are, the one con 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 205 

tained in the Brooklyn report of 1845, viz : that the mission churches receive 
slaveholders to fellowship ; and slaves, to a certain extent, are hired of their 
owners to work at the Choctaw hoarding-schools. While this is the fact, 
the Indian youth must of course learn contempt of labor along with the 
rudiments of science, and slavery must become part of their intellectual 
culture, if not of their religious. 

" Of this the Prudential Committee seem to have been convinced, and 
hence, in Mr. Treat's celebrated letter of June 22d, last year, the Pruden- 
tial Committee declare, explicitly, that the Board could never have intended 
that slaveholders should be received to church-membership, ' without 

INQUIRING AS TO THEIR VIEWS AND FEELINGS IN REGARD TO SLAVERY.' And 

if ' he holds and treats those for whom Christ died with a selfish spirit 
and for selfish purposes,' they say, ' for admitting such an one to the 
privileges of the people of God, especially in the advanced stage to which 
your mission has arrived, we know no warrant whatever.' And while they 
hold this strong and explicit language on the subject of receiving slavehold- 
ers into the church, they use far stronger and more explicit language on the 
subject of employing slaves at the schools. They say on this subject to the 
missionaries, ' If you can discover no method by which a change can be 
effected, we submit for your consideration whether it be not desirable to 
request the Choctaw government to relieve us from our engagement in 
respect to the boarding-schools.' — Treat's Letter, June 22, 1848. 

" The report of Mr. Treat of his visit to the Choctaw and Cherokee 
missions, with the correspondence growing out of it, were reported to the 
Board at their meeting in Boston last year ; and while the anti-slavery por- 
tions of the American churches regarded the ground taken by the Prudential 
Committee, and the Board as silently acquiescing in it, as essentially anti- 
slavery and satisfactory to reasonable Christians,* loud and bitter complaints 
were raised by the missionaries among the Choctaws, and generally by the 
pro-slavery portions of the church. These complaints against the Pruden- 
tial Committee have been extensively published during the last year in tin: 
New York Observer, Christian Observer, and other Presbyterian papers 
further South. 

* With perfect respect to the Committee that drafted, and the Association that 
adopted this paper, the author submits that the ground taken by the Prudential 
Committee, even if it had been maintained by the Board, ovgM not to be satisfactory 
to " reasonable Christians." By the implication that slaves arc sometimes held 

1 otherwise than " with a selfish spirit and for selfish purposes" — and that such slave 

| holding is consistent with church-membership, the very gist of the whole contro 
vcrsy is relinquished. Such a diluted testimony only invited the resistance it 

' received. If slaveholding is wrong, there is no occasion or propriety in asking t he- 
candidate's " views and feelings in regard to slavery" while he continues the prac- 
tice, and is to be indulged in it. But if the practice be right, the question becomes 

; manifestly useless 



206 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

" In these circumstances, the public looked with intense interest to the 
late meeting of the Board at Pittsfield, Massachusetts. If the Board ever 
intends to cease to sustain slaveholding mission-churches, and slave-hiring 
mission-schools, it would seem that thirteen years is ample time for the 
Board to make up its mind to declare, at least, that such is its future inten- 
tion. But, instead of any such intimation, Mr. Secretary Treat simply 
reported to the Board an apologetic and deprecatory note issued by the 
Secretaries during the year, in answer to the complaints against Treat's 
letter, and the reply to that letter of the Choctaw missionaries. In this 
note, issued from the mission-house in February last, the Secretaries 
say : ' The committee have never had any intention of "cutting off" the 
Choctaw mission from its connection with the Board,' but repeat the expres- 
sion of their ' undiminished confidence in the integrity of these servants of 
Christ.' 

" The reply of the Choctaw missionaries to Mr. Treat's letter is written 
in a softer tone than their letter to which Mr. Treat's was a reply, but it 
abates no whit of their former pretensions, and surrenders no principle laid 
down in their former letter. 

" On the subject of receiving slaveholders to church-membership, a prin- 
cipal point of Mr. Treat's letter of June 22d, thkv do not deign to sav 
one word ; but simply observe, that five and twenty years ago they thought 
' the subject of slavery, as it relates to their mission, was settled upon a 
scriptural basis.' 

" On the subject of hiring slaves of their owners to do the work of the 
mission-schools, they at great length vindicate their right to do so, 
placing it upon the same ground with using slave-grown produce in the free 
States. They, however, feebly intimate their willingness to ' employ none 
but free help, provided it can be obtained ;' but assert, over and again, their 
intention to hire slaves, if necessary. 

" The above papers were submitted to the Board, with an intimation that 
no action upon them was desired, on the ground that the correspondence 
(now of thirteen years' standing) is not yet completed ! 

Dr. Bacon, of New Haven, moved the reference of the subject to a 
special committee ; but this motion was overruled by a proposition of Chan- 
cellor Walworth, and the subject passed off without action or discussion, 
with a remark of the Secretary's report, as reported by the N. Y. Evangelist, 
' That the mission are willing to do all that can properly be required of them 
to place this subject on the desired basis.' 

" In respect to the above, it will be observed : 

" 1. That the missionaries intimate no intention ever to cease receiving 
slaveholders to their churches, but vindicate the practice as scriptural. 

" 2. That the Board, by its Brooklyn report, to which it adheres, has con- 
stituted them and their churches sole judges on the subject. 



SLAVEKY AND FREEDOM. 207 

•' 3. It follows, that contributors to the Board's fund must perpetually, so 
far as any contrary hope appears, contribute to the propagation of a slave- 
holding Christianity. And, 

'* 4. That slaves are to do the work of the mission-schools till, in the 
missionaries' judgment, it is practicable to obtain free help." 

If anything further be wanting to define the position of the 
American Board, it may be furnished by an inspection of the 
rejected amendments to the celebrated Brooklyn Eeport of 
18-15. On that occasion, the late Amos A. Phelps presented 
and advocated a series of resolutions, characterizing the 
"practice of slaveholding a great moral evil, entirely opposed 
to the spirit and principles of the gospel " — declaring that the 
Board could not appoint or sustain slaveholders as mission- 
aries — and calling on the missionaries to treat slaveholding as 
they do other sins. 

Dr. Leonard Bacon, of New Haven, Conn., who said he 
could not consent to the amendment of Mr. Phelps, introduced 
in room of them the following: 

" 1. Resolved, That inasmuch as the system of domestic slavery, under 
every modification, is at war with the principles of Christianity, with natu- 
ral justice, with industry and thrift, with habits of subjection to law, and 
with whatever tends to the advancement of civilization and the ascendency 
of the gospel ; and inasmuch as it brings upon every community which 
establishes and upholds it, the righteous displeasure of God, and the repro- 
bation of the civilized and Christian world, the existence of slavery in the 
Cherokee and Choctaw nations is deeply to be lamented by their friends, 
and particularly by this Board, as having been, for more than a quarter of a 
century, engaged in labors tending to their moral, intellectual, and social 
advancement. 

" 2. Resolved, That while the strongest language of reprobation is not too 
strong to be applied to the system of slavery, truth and justice require this 
Board to say that the mere relation of a master to one whom the constitu- 
tion of society has made a slave, is not to be regarded as in all cases such 
a sin as to require the exclusion of the master, without further inquiry, from 
Christian ordinances. 

" 3. Resolved, That the missionaries of this Board, everywhere, are 
expected to admit to Christian ordinances those, and only those, who give 
satisfactory evidence of having become new creatures in Christ. 

" 4. Resolved, That the master who buys and sells human beings, as mer- 
chandise, for gain — who does not recognize in respect to his servants the 



208 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

divine sanctity of their relations as husbands and wives, and as parents and 
children — who permits them to live and die in ignorance of God, and of 
God's word, who does not render to his servants that which is just and 
equal, or who refuses to recognize, heartily and practically, their dignity 
and worth, as reasonable and accountable beings, for whom Christ has died, 
does not give satisfactory evidence of being born of God, or having the 
Spirit of Christ." 

Though these resolutions abstain carefully from condemn- 
ing slaveholding as sinful — a doctrine which the mover, in 
his speech, earnestly disclaimed, saying, " the churches cannot 
stand such nonsense " (producing a broad laugh among the 
members of the Board), yet they too clearly condemned 
known and existing practices, called abuses, to meet the exi- 
gencies of the Board. 

Dr. De Witt, very sagaciously, said — " These resolutions 
will introduce a disturbing influence, and occasion future 
inconvenience." 

On motion of Chief Justice Williams, of Connecticut, they 
were referred, together with Mr. Phelps' resolutions, to a select 
committee of five, of which he was made chairman. The 
committee reported, verbally, the next morning, recommend- 
ing the adoption of the original report of Dr. Woods, without 
the amendments. Mr. Phelps then promptly renewed the 
substance of his former resolutions, in a more condensed 
form, which he moved as an amendment, as follows : 

" And finally, in accordance with, and in reply to the memorials submitted 
to it from Worcester county and elsewhere at its present meeting, the Board 
deem it right and proper to say, that its funds cannot and will not be expended 
in maintaining slaveholding missionaries, or building up slaveholding churches ; 
that in carrying out the general principles laid down in the first part of the 
foregoing report, in their practical application to the question of receiving 
slaveholders to, and retaining in the missionary churches, the Board will 
expect its missionaries and churches to treat slaveholding, in the matter of 
instruction, admonition and discipline, in the same manner as they should 
and would treat drunkenness, gaming, falsehood, bigamy, idolatry, and the 
like ; and that whenever and wherever it shall appear that the missionaries 
and the churches, in exercise of their appropriate liberty, do not do so, it 
will be the duty of this Board, in the exercise of its liberty, to dissolve far- 
ther connection with them." 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 209 

After some ineffectual efforts to dodge a direct vote on this 
amendment, it was voted upon, and voted down, a few voices 
only being heard in its favor. 

This meeting of the Board was also made famous by the 
advocacy of the doctrine, involved in the report, that "organic 
sins," or sins "interwoven in the structure of society," or 
sanctioned by civil government, are not to be considered and 
treated, in the administration of church discipline, as personal 
sins — as though personality could be impaired, or individual 
accountability set aside, by practicing an iniquity framed or 
allowed by civil rulers, or by following a multitude to do 
evil ! 

THE AMERICAN HOME MISSIONARY SOCIETY. 

This society, supported by Presbyterians and Congregation- 
alists, builds up, with professions of the most liberal and dig- 
nified impartiality, either a pro-slavery or an anti-slaverv 
religion, provided it be manifested in accordance with the ap- 
proved forms and technicalities of the allied sects, north and 
south, co operating in the enterprise. In this, it stands, sub- 
stantially, on the same ground with the American Board. 

"There is, to this day, no vote, or rule, or usage of either Board, to 
keep slaveholders, who are unobjectionable in other respects, out of their 
churches at home or abroad, or even to prevent slaves being hired of their 
masters to labor at the Mission Schools, where pagan youth are congregated 
to form, under Christian education, their ideas of Gospel principles and 
practice. 

" The Home Society has, moreover, instead of diminishing, increased 
its slaveholding dependencies during the present era of anti-slavery agita- 
tion. Since 1842 — that is, in the seven years preceding the last report — 
the American Home Missionary Society lacks but Jive of having trebled 
the slaveholding churches under her patronage, while it has added but little 
more than one-fifth to its whole Missionary force." — Letter of Pres. Blan- 
chard and others to the Cincinnati Convention, April, 1850. 

' ; The American Home Missionary Society has fifty-six churches in slave 
States, all open to the reception of slaveholders." — "J. J5.," in Chr. Era, 
Oct. 2, 1851. 

And how is it with the Missionary Societies of other sects? 

We answer in the words of Pres. Blanchard. 

14 



GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

The American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions and the 
,ome Missionary Society certainly contrast favorably with the correspond- 
ing agencies in their sister sects. Their records show at least enough 
hostility to slaveholding mingling with their councils, to keep the subject 
in agitation from year to year." — lb. 

OTHER AGENCIES. 

" The missionary piety of a country is its popular piety. Bible, Tract, 
Sunday School, and other subordinate operations, walk in the light of the 
missionary enterprise, and are merely an expansion and part of it. We 
have not the statistics at hand, but a table showing the sum annually col- 
lected and disbursed in this country for religious and benevolent uses, under 
circumstances which imply the admission of slaveholding to the com- 
munion table, is alone sufficient to keep up the evangelical character of 
slavery. For every subscriber who pays, and every agent who collects, 
and every person who receives a shilling of the conscience fund of the 
United States, which is raised by that religion which allows slavery to its 
communion table, either consciously or unconsciously utters a silent con- 
fession of his faith, that slaveholding is privileged in the Church of God." 
—lb. 

CThe American Bible Society, at an early day, aroused 
e religious community with the proposal to supply every 
family in the United States with Bibles. The auxiliary socie- 
ties, the agents, and the ministry in general, for a number of 
years, kept the enterprise prominently before the public ; large 
and general contributions were made for the object; the 
widow's mite was cast into the treasurj', and, at length, the 
report went forth, re-published by the presses of Christendom, 
that the magnificent work had been accomplished. On inves- 
tigation, some time afterwards, it appeared that there had 
been a slight oversight in the statement. The bulk of the 
laboring population, in half the states of the republic had, 
somehow, been overlooked in the distribution. The only rea- 
sons of this neglect were, that they were of a darker complex- 
ion than their neighbors, were of African descent, were chiefly 
held as slaves, and for these causes were not encouraged or 
permitted to read. The number of the families left destitute 
(regarding every five persons as a family) was four hundred 
and sixty thousand, or, a population of two millions three 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 211 

hundred thousand, comprising a little more than one-sixth part 
of the population of the whole country. 

This was quite an important destitution. With a view to 
its supply, the American Anti-Slavery Society, in May, 1834, 
(through a committee representing several religious denomina- 
tions,) submitted a written proposal to the American Bible 
Society, in which they offered to contribute to the funds of 
the society five thousand dollars, provided the society would 
appropriate the same amount to the supply of the destitute 
colored population, and carry the measure into effect in two 
years from the 4th of July, 1834. 

The offer was not accepted by the Bible Society, and no 
mention was made of it in its Annual Eeport. Prominent 
members and supporters of the institution professed to regard 
the offer as a rude attack, amounting to an insult. The chief 
apologies for the course of the society were, (1) that the laws 
of the slave states did not permit the slaves to read, and (2), 
that the work of distribution belonged to the auxiliaries, and 
not to the parent society. To these apologies it is sufficient to 
answer that in its foreign operations the society does not hold 
itself circumscribed by the legislation that interdicts the scrip- 
tures — nor did its structure nor the proper province of its aux- 
iliaries debar the parent society from proposing the supply of 
every family in the United States with Bibles. It would have 
been as easy for it to have proposed the completion of that sup- 
ply, and undoubtedly this would have been done, if there had 
been no fear of offending slaveholding church members. — See 
Emancipator, May 27, and June 24, 1834. 

An agent of the Bible Society, some time afterwards, was 
detected in furnishing a Bible to a colored person in New Or- 
leans. He was arrested, but released on the ground of his not 
being acquainted with the laws, and his promising not to re- 
peat the offence. The Bible Society of New Orleans, auxil- 
iary to the American Bible Society, publicly disclaimed the 
act, and protested its innocency of any intent to furnish the 
colored people with Bibles. The " Parent Society" is not 



212 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

known to have uttered any reproof or remonstrance to its 
" auxiliary" or any regret at the course it pursued. 

At a meeting of the Orleans County (N. Y.) Bible Society, 
" a Kesolution was introduced, that the society request the 
American Bible Society to make a donation of Bibles for the 
fugitive slaves in Canada West. This was opposed, and finally 
lost." No laws against the distribution could be pleaded in 
this case.* — Oberlin Evangelist, July 2, 1845. Ghr. Inv. 
March, 1846. 

Whatever of progress, or appearance of progress, has been 
made by the American Bible Society, will be shown by the 
following. 

" Public attention, says the Annual Report of the A. and F. Anti-Slavery 
Society (1849), has been drawn, more than at any previous time, towards 
the obligation of circulating the Bible among the slave population. The 
South begins to feel that ' considerations of sound policy, as well as Chris- 
tian obligation,' require attention to the subject. Some Christians in that 
portion of the country realize the duty of supplying slaves with the Bible, 
and are doing it to a limited extent. At the North, unwonted interest has 
been manifested on the subject. The American Bible Society has been 
urged to take up the matter. In their monthly ' Record,' under the head 
of ' Slaves,' they acknowledge receipts for this purpose ; but in a circular 
issued some months since, they say, ' Local distributions should be made 
under the direction of the auxiliaries. On these organizations at the South 
devolves the duty, beyond doubt, of supplying the slave population of that 
region — so far as this work is to be done;'' and they request that contribu- 
tors to the income of the Society would not restrict their contributions to 
this object, as the funds must remain in part unexpended. It has also been 
stated to applicants, at the Bible House, that they have no fund for slaves, 
that they do not intend to have, and rather than have, they would prefer 
to return to the donors money sent for that object. At the same time, it is 
but just to say, that the managers of the American Bible Society resolve 
that they will promptly avail themselves of every opportunity to further 
the distribution of the Bible among the slave population at the South, and 
that copies will be supplied to any responsible person for that object. The 
secretary acknowledges that the applications of the Anti-Slavery Society 
have done good, and the managers avow, in the circular, that ' so far as 

* The excuse made was, that the measure would be thought to savor of abolition- 
ism, would hazard the peace and welfare of the society, and therefore it should bo 
left to individuals to make the request. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 213 

there are colored freemen, or slaves within the limits of an auxiliary, who 
can be reached, who are capable of reading the blessed word of God, and 
are without it, they should unquestionably be furnished with it, a* well as 
any other class of our ruined race." — Liberty Almanac for 1849. ' 

The American" Tract Society prepares, publishes, and 
circulates tracts against every sin forbidden in the decalogue, 
except that particular form of sin which involves the violation 
of the entire code — the sin of subverting the family relation, 
reducing the image of God to a chattel, and robbing a man of 
himself. 

The charge is not that they decline circulating the writings 
of " modern fanatics," on this subject. They equally avoid 
circulating the testimonies of Hopkins, of Edwards, of Wesley, 
of Grotius, of Hannah More, of John Locke, of John Jay, of 
Dr. Primatt, of Dr. Price, of the Abbe Raynal, of the Abbe 
Gregoire, of James Beattie, of Dr. Adam Clarke, of Arch 
Deacon Paley, of Edmund Burke, of Dr. Johnson, of Bishop 
Horsley, of Bishop Porteus, of Dr. Robertson, of Bishop \Var- 
berton, of Thomas Scott, of Granville Sharp, of Thomas 
Clarkson, of Fowell Buxton, of Dr. Dick, of John Angell 
James — of the Christian poets, Cowper, Pollok, and Mont- 
gomery. The volumes of general Christian literature since 
the beginning of the African slave trade, furnish, it would 
seem, no suitable materials from which the Committee of the 
American Tract Society, Avith all their tact and skill in the art 
of pruning, could cull an eight page tract against human chat- 
telhood, against slaveholding, against the slave system, or 
even in relation to those topics. 

More marvellous, still : — In all the ranks of the learned, the 
wise, the good, the discreet, of our own age and nation, who 
cherish the American Tract Society as an instrumentality for 
teaching human relations and duties, for admonishing an err- 
ing world of its sins; among all the writers on whom the 
Tract Committee depend, and to whom they look for tracts 
adapted to the times we live in, not one, it seems, has been pre- 
vailed upon or has succeeded, in furnishing a page of instruc- 
tion upon a subject in respect to which — it is said — imprudent 



214 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN" 

and rash writers are leading Christians astray ! What a won- 
derful condition of things is this? "What sorcery has para- 
lyzed this arm of the Church — the arm that should wield the 
Christian press, amid the influences that corrupt and destroy? 
But this is not the worst of the case. The Society is not 
merely guilty of neglect. It commits a positive injury. By 
its mutilation of books it compels the common christian lit- 
erature of the English language to bear false witness. By its 
garbled biographies of the sainted dead, by its suppression of 
their earnest testimony againt slavery, by its smothering the 
expression of the purest christian affections of their hearts, 
it hides the distinctive traits of their christian character, and 
falsely holds them up as specimens of the kind of piety that 
expresses no abhorrence of slaveholding. It is a perversion 
of truth. It is a deceitful representation of the character de- 
scribed : 

" A case has recently appeared ; the memoir of Mary Lundie Duncan, of 
Scotland, by her mother. _ It first had a wide circulation abroad ; then was 
published in this country, in lull, by the Carters, in various styles, and some 
of them as cheap as could be desired ; but now has been published, abridged, 
by the American Tract Society. It is, however, abridged very slightly, 
its size being scarcely at all lessened, but some important omissions are 
made. 

"According to the Independent (for January 22), the following is omitted 
on page 79 : 

" ' We have been lately much interested in the emancipation of slaves : 
I never heard eloquence more overpowering than that of George Thompson. 
I am most thankful that he has been raised up. O that the measure soon 
to be proposed in Parliament may be effectual !' 

"In the following paragraph, the sentences in brackets are expunged in 
the Tract Society's edition : 

" ' August 1. Freedom has dawned this morning upon the British colonies. 
[No more degraded lower than the brutes — no more bowed down with 
suffering from which there is no redress.} The sons of Africa have ob- 
tained the rights of fellow-subjects, the rights of man, the immortal creation 
of God. [Now they may seek the sanctuary, fearless of the lash ; they 
may call their children their own.} Hope will animate their hearts, and 
give vigor to their efforts.' 

" Such mutilations have their object. We are sorry to see in them an 
unworthy subserviency to the foul behests of slavery." — Oberlin Evangelist, 
1852. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 215 

Such is a specimen of the methods of those who superin- 
tend our religious literature, and who cannot approve " the 

measures" of abolitionists. 

'The American Sunday School Union is prompt to ex- 
purgate from her Sunday School libraries whatever may have 
incidentally crept into them, in familiar abstracts of Scripture 
history, which might be construed into a disapproval of Ameri- 
can slavery, though the books may not have been written for 
that end, nor by writers at all identified with present efforts 
for the abolition of slavery.* 

CONCLUDING remarks. 

Wj& must not pursue, further, the specific action of the 
American churches, and the organizations that have grown 
out of them. Apart from what has been presented already, 
and much more of the same character, which it would be 
easy to add, there is one general fact, the consideration of 
which might suffice, of itself, to determine the question of 
their relation to slavery. The Northern churches commonlj' 
foster the spirit of caste by repudiating social equality with 
the colored man, and by maintaining the negro pew. This 
fact has been adverted to by legislators in the free states, 
(once in a Report by a Legislative Committee of the State of 
New York) as furnishing the reason why it is impossible for 
the State Governments to restore to the colored citizens their 
acknowledged political and civil rights. So long as this un- 
righteous prejudice is indulged by the churches, it must bind 
them to the car of the slave-power as its voluntary victims 
and tools. It must seal their lips from the utterance of God's 
words of rebuke. While such diseases prey upon the vitals 
of the Church, while she "refuses to be healed, and knows not 



* The late Mr. Gallaudet, who was never identified with active abolitionists, 
revised an English book for the American Sunday School Union, called " Jacob and 
his Sons," in three small volumes, which, after being circulated awhile, was dropped 
by tho committee, because, in its biography of Joseph, it contained a passage 
alluding to slavery, which gave offence to the South. 



216 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

that her strength has departed," in vain shall her prophets cry 
" Peace ! peace !" or her physicians prescribe panaceas for her 
wounds. 

In the preceding records, we have aimed not only to guard 
against the injustice of indiscriminate censure, but have en- 
deavored, as far as practicable, to separate the topic of this 
chapter (the position of the Churches in respect to slavery) 
from their relation to " modem abolitionists " and their peculiar 
and distinctive "measures." That topic we propose to take 
up in another chapter. We have not obtruded it here. We 
have not written them down "pro-slavery" because they 
" followed not with us" — nor because we have been earnestly 
opposed by them. They claim to be "as much opposed to 
slavery as the abolitionists themselves." The impartial reader 
will now judge for himself of that claim. He has seen what 
they have done and said on the subject, and what they have 
declined saying and doing ; and he has seen this, by itself, 
disconnected with any controversies concerning " modern abo- 
litionists and their measures." Whatever may be said of 
them, the single point presented in this chapter is the relation 
of the American Churches, as organized bodies, to the prac- 
tice of slaveholding. On that point alone, let the reader now 
make up his opinion. 

And when he has done this, let him next inquire whether 
it is probable that the Churches, other ecclesiastical bodies, 
and leading ministers, of the different sects in this country, 
could hold such a position in respect to slaveholding, church 
discipline, religious instruction, and the missionary enterprise, 
without being brought, of necessity, into a state of hostility 
to any body of earnest, persevering, and consistent men and 
christians, who should seek, from high moral, religious and 
benevolent considerations, the present and entire abolition of 
slavery. 

He will do well to inquire also whether any ordinary or 
even possible manifestations of wisdom and circumspection, 
on the part of such a bod\ r of men, would be likely to pre- 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 217 

vent, or could prevent, their collision with religionists holding 
such a position respecting slavery and slaveholding. And 
when he comes to examine the facts reserved for another 
chapter of this history, he will be able, perhaps, to make up 
his mind, intelligently and conclusively, on the whole subject. 
The verdict of an impartial posterity can easily be foreseen. 
Already that verdict is beginning to be anticipated by men of 
calm minds, who have stood aloof, as lookers-on, during the 
whole struggle, or until quite recently, and who are far enough, 
even now, from adventuring to co-operate with any class of 
active abolitionists, or severing their ecclesiastical connections. 

"Let the time come," says Albert Barnes, "when, in all the mighty 
denominations of Christians, it can be announced that the evil is ceased 
with them forever ; and let the voice of each denomination be lifted up in 
kind, but firm and solemn testimony against the system — with no mealy 
words, with no attempt at apology, with no wish to blink it, with no effort 
to throw the sacred shield of religion over so great an evil — and the work 
is done. There is no public sentiment in this land — there could be none 
created — that would resist the power of such testimony. There is no 
power out of the church that could sustain slavery an hour, if it were not 
sustained in it." 

IIow idle then, is it, for churches and ministers to think of 
shielding themselves from censure, by dwelling on the real or 
supposed faults of abolitionists ! Why have they not accom- 
plished the work themselves? Why, at the least, are they 
not now attempting it ? 

Their real position is revealed clearly by the continual re- 
currence of a class of significant incidents, too numerous and 
too scattered for convenient classification and record. We 
present here a few specimens : 

At the Religious Anniversaries in New York in May, at an 
early period, some time between 1832 and 1835 inclusive, 
(we have not the precise date) a number of ministers and 
others from the country, in attending the early morning 
prayer meetings, before the public exercises, were heard to 
pray for the poor slaves — some of them, perhaps, for the abo- 
lition of slavery. Among these was the venerable Rev. 
Ethan Smith, the writer on the prophecies. The incident, 



2 IS GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

without mention of names, was conspicuously heralded in the 
New York Observer and kindred prints, in illustration of the 
meddlesome and mischievous expedients of abolitionists to 
disturb the harmony of the anniversaries, and mar the peace 
of the Church. 

Similar complaints of anti-slavery prayers have been com- 
mon all over the country, and have not yet ceased ; and quite 
recently, Dr. Spring has said, — " If, by one prayer I could 
liberate every slave in the land, I would not dare to offer it." 
This might deserve the commendation of honest frankness, if 
the same class of persons would not claim (especially on visit- 
ing England) to desire the abolition of slavery, as much as 
anybody, and complain that " the imprudence of abolitionists 
had put back the event half a century." 

When news of the British Act of Emancipation reached 
America, there was a general prediction of bloodshed, and 
American abolitionists were implicated with those of England, 
in the responsibility and the guilt. The religious presses 
were forward in this. After the first panic was over, they 
spoke of it as "an experiment." The New York Observer, 
yielding to public sympathy, went so far as to say that if all 
went on peacefully, the abolition controversy in America would 
be at an end, as there could be but one sentiment among 
Christians. And there could not be, aside from the influences 
represented by such papers as the New York Observer. Well ; 
the testimony of the West India authorities and of Queen 
Victoria to the peacefulness and benefits of emancipation at 
length reached us. Edward Everett (who, as Governor of 
Massachusetts, had been forward to intimate that abolitionists 
should be " indicted at Common Law,") was now ready, in a 
published letter, to recognize the glorious event. But the 
co-operation of the leading churches, ministry, and religious 
presses, has not been secured to the cause of freedom. Their 
opposition has scarcely been relaxed. With some it is more 
bitter than ever. The benefits of West India emancipation 
must be learned through other channels than those directed 
by them. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 219 

The "imprudence" of the immediatists was magnified. Some 
plan of "gradualism" was preferred. "When John Quincy 
Adams, after great deliberation and labor, prepared and pre- 
sented in Congress his plan for gradual abolition, he doubtless 
expected the ready co-operation of the religious portion of 
the community not committed to the immediatists. But he 
met with, literally, nothing of the kind, that reached the pub- 
lic ear. Not a sermon, not a clerical letter, not an ecclesiastical 
resolution, not a paragraph of a religious editor, not a corres- 
pondent of a religious periodical, so far as we could ever learn, 
commended the measure. Political editors were equally silent. 
The proposition fell like a weight of lead to the ground. This 
one fact (almost forgotten already) decides the position of the 
leading churches and ministry of the North on the slave 
question. 



220 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 



CHAPTER XIX. 

ACTION OF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT, TO THE CLOSE OF 
THE FIRST PRESIDENTIAL ADMINISTRATION. 

Preliminary observations — Secrecy of the Convention of 1787 — Names and dates of 
the different Presidents — Federal action under the first President — Action in Con- 
gress on the Anti-Slavery petitions — Acceptance of Slave territory (now Ten 
nessee), ceded, under restrictions, by North Carolina — Cession of the Federal 
District — Congressional re-enactment of Slavery — The act unconstitutional — Fugi- 
tive Slave Bill of 1793 — Examination of it — Unconstitutional provisions — Escape 
of a female slave of the President — Slavery in the Federal District — Naturalization 
Law, 1790, for " while persons" — Act of 1792 for organizing a " white" militia — 
Admission of Tennessee as a Slave State, 1796 — Kentucky previously. 

From the Church, we now turn again to the State. Having 
seen the position of the former, we need not be surprised by 
any similar manifestations in the latter. When the salt loses 
its savor, we may expect to meet with putrefaction in the 
masses around it. The political morality of a nation may 
sometimes fall below the level of its current religion, but 
never rises above it. When the leading religious teachers of 
a country maintain that sins " interwoven by legislation into 
the structure and frame-work of society,", may therefore find a 
quiet home in the Church, there can be no effectual security 
against unrighteous enactments. A high premium — so to 
speak — is thus bid, before hand, for Avicked laws.* When 
such teachers denounce the doctrine that iniquitous enactments 
are, before God, null and void, and that the laws of God are 

* The Fugitive Slave Bill was enacted in 1850. The doctrine that " organic" or 
national sins must not be excluded from the Church, was promulgated at the meet- 
ing of the American Board, in Brooklyn, in 1845. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 221 

of higher authority than the edicts of man, the defences of 
liberty as well as the foundations of morality -will be likely to 
give way, and the land be inundated with despotism and 
crime. So long as moral causes continue to produce then- 
appropriate effects, it must remain true that a people consent- 
ing to come under the influence of such teachers, must be 
exposed to the loss of their liberties. And while a God of 
, equity controls human affairs, a people that voluntarily 
sustain such enactments must fall under his displeasure. 

It must be a short-sighted ambition, whether in ecclesiastics 
or statesmen, that overlooks, in its estimates, the sure verdict 

■ of coming years, and purchases the popularity of an hour at 
the price of a perpetual future infamy. They should know 

. that no arts of cunning can cover them from the scrutiny of 
posterity, and no power of patronage protect them from the 
reproving pages of history. And in this anticipation they 
should read the presage of the still surer sentence of their 
Supreme Judge, in the world to come. 

Wicked rulers may be canonized by false teachers, and, for 
a season, be reverenced for saints, as well as lauded for states- 
men. But Time, (to say nothing of Eternity) will tear off the 

• mask, and their names will stand for the representatives of 
falsehood and folly. 

In the State, as in the Church, the downward course of 
declension is often silent, stealthy, and for a time, unperceived, 
but without repentance and amendment, apostacy and ruin 
must be the final result. 

Sustained by such sentiments, and commending them to the 
reader, we now approach the inner sanctuary of our political 

■ temple, (the temple, perhaps, of our nation's idolatry,) into 
which it has been thought sacrilege to gaze. The reverence 

i with which we have been accustomed to regard the doings of 
our half-deified statesmen, may now be sadly disturbed. But 
the scrutiny must proceed ; and though the Hebrew prophets' 
" chambers of imagery" should be revealed, we must brace 
wide open the doors. If the sight reduces our reverence of 

I men, it may increase our veneration of God. 



222 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN" 



SECRECY OF THE FEDERAL CONVENTION OF 1787. 

One of the most important facts in our national history, so 
far as the connection of the Federal Government with slavery 
is concerned, bears the same date with the sittings of the 
Convention of Delegates, in 1787, by whom the draft of our 
Federal Constitution was prepared ; and it stands connected 
with the circumstances and manner of their procedure. It is 
the fact that that most important Convention, (a knowledge of 
whose discussions was of deeper interest to the people, than 
the knowledge of any other discussions ever held in the 
country,) sat constantly with closed doors, and under an injunction 
of secrecy, the veil remaining unlifted, till the generation 
whose responsibilities required a knowledge of those delibera- 
tions, had not only acted, but had passed off the stage. 

It is in no spirit of censoriousness that we allude to this 
important historical fact. We neither say nor believe that the 
arrangement was adopted for unworthy ends. Assuredly this 
was not the purpose of the noble friends of universal liberty 
who were members of that body. The arrangement may 
nevertheless be regarded a most important historical fact, and 
one upon which the entire political history of the country, as 
connected with slavery, has ever since hinged. It may also 
be regarded as a most calamitous fact, and one for the 
existence of which, there seems to have been no adequate 
cause. The Convention was not a military council, delibe- 
rating upon measures that might have been reported in the 
camp of an enemy. It was a political body, sitting in time of 
peace, and among constituents who were entitled to know Jwio 
and why they were acting. It is natural to suppose that the 
policy of secrecy resulted from habits and maxims imbibed 
under a kingly dynasty. This apology may excuse the 
delegates, but it could not do away the effects of their arrange- 
ment. It was anti-democratic in its character, and could not 
but produce corresponding results. It is important that the 
friends of freedom observe this, and derive from it a maxim 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 223 

for future guidance: ' The slightest departure from demo<:r>i<-i/ 
endangers freedom. 1 

Had the Convention sat with open doors, with their delib- 
erations gazetted daily, as in Congress, there is no room to 
believe that the slave question in America could ever have 
stood where it now stands. What is now shrouded in mys- 
tery would have been held up in the light of the sun. Had 
the people of that generation found in those proceedings, the 
"compromises" and "understandings" now claimed for 
slavery, the draft reported would never have been " the Con- 
stitution." No draft, in connection with such " understand- 
ings," would ever have been reported. The reader of the 
preceding history will judge of this, for himself.* But if (as 
we believe) there were no such " understandings" and " com- 
promises," other than those found in the draft, the gazetted 
discussions would have disclosed none, and no pretensions of 
them could have been afterwards set up. In either case, the 
open Convention would have given us a free country, in- 
stead of a conquered territory of the Slave-Power, ruled by a 
petty oligarchy of slaveholders. 

It is easy to see how the arrangement of secrecy gave rise 
to the pretensions of the Slave Power, in the first place, and 
has favored it ever since. It could not fail to favor the arts 
of any in the Convention (if there were such) who might 
choose to make use of the Constitution for purposes of evil, 
of which the people, ivhose instrument and act it zuas, never 
dreamed. It opened the door for conjecture, for insinuation, 
for assumption, for the monopoly of occult interpretation, for 
the claim of unexpressed " understandings, compromises and 
guaranties." It afforded opportunity to give direction to 
technical ambiguity and circumlocution, in the document 
itself. It enabled Cabinets, Legislatures, and Courts of Law, 
if they pleased, to foist, unperceived, a Constitution of 
their own devising, in the place of the Constitution submitted 
to the people. The people, in such a case, can have no sccu- 



See Chapters VIII. and IX. 



224 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

ritj from the most monstrous perversions of the Constitution, 
but by insisting upon a rigorous adherence to that righteous 
rule of legal interpretation, based upon the Common Law, 
that imperatively forbids any construction to be put upon any 
instrument which shall make it conflict with equity and 
justice, so long as the language employed will possibly ad- 
mit of a construction which would make it equitable. "What 
a revolution would an adherence to that righteous rule pro- 
duce ! 

The following Table will be useful for reference, as we 
proceed : 

George Washington was President from 1789 to 1797. 

John Adams " " " 1797 to 1801. 

Thomas Jefferson u " " 1801 to 1809. 

James Madison " " " 1809 to 1817. 

James Monroe " " " 1817 to 1825. 

John Quincy Adams " " " 1825 to 1829. 

Andrew Jackson " " " 1829 to 1837. 

Martin Van Buren " " " 1837 to 1841. 

William H. Harrison, and / ,, ,, 1GM , 10 i- 

' 1841 to 184o. 

John lyler ) 

James K. Polk " " " 1845 to 1849. 

Zachary Taylor " " 1849 to July 9, 1850. 

Millard Fillmore " " (July 9) 1850 to 

Slaveholding Presidents, about 49 years — Non-Slavehold- 
ing, about 14 years, up to 4th of March, 1852.* 

FEDERAL ACTION UNDER THE FIRST PRESIDENT. 

The anti-slavery petitions of 1790, before mentioned,*}- 
though they evidently found favor with the majority of the 
members of Congress, nevertheless failed of securing their 
object. A somewhat favorable Report was made by the 

* Washington was inaugurated April 30th; his successors (except Tyler and 
Fillmore), March 4th. Harrison survived his inauguration but ono month, Taylor 
one year and above four months. 

t Chapter X. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 225 

Committee to whom they were referred, in which the confi- 
dence was expressed that the State Legislatures would revise 
their laws, from time to time, when necessary, and promote 
the objects mentioned in the memorials, and every other measure 
that may tend to the happiness of slaves " — also assuring the 
memorialists that "in all cases to which the authority of Con- 
gress extends, they will exert it for the humane objects of 
the memorialists, so far as they can be promoted on the prin- 
ciples of justice, humanity, and good policy." — 2 Deb. Cong. 
Old Ser. 1465, as quoted by S. P. Chase, U. S. Senate, March 
26, 1850. 

In deference to the members from South Carolina and 
Georgia, this Keport was frittered away till it embraced only 
these points, viz : that Congress could not interfere with sla- 
very in the States, nor prohibit the importation of slaves till 
1808, but could prohibit American citizens from importing 
slaves for the supply of foreigners, and provide for the humane 
treatment, on their passage, of slaves imported here. Thus 
was taken the first step in the policy of evasion and compro- 
mise, in the Congress of the United States, from which has 
followed its downward course ever since. Vide Speech of S. P. 
Chase, as above. 

In the same year (1790) North Carolina tendered to the 
United States a cession of territory including the present 
State of Tennessee, on condition that the provisions of the 
Ordinance of 1787, for the North Western territory, prohibit- 
ing slavery, should not be extended over that region. The 
cession was accepted on these terms. Thus the policy of the 
country, on that subject, was reversed, and Congress ivfis led, 
for the first time, to give its direct sanction to slavery. — (lb.) 

* By the Constitution of the United States, Congress was empowered " to 
exercise exclusive legislation in all cases whatsoever, over such district 
(not exceeding ten miles square) as may, by cession of particular States, 
and the acceptance of Congress, become the seat of Government of the 
United States." — Art. I., sec. 3. 

On the 22d of December, 1788, Maryland made an act of 
cession for this purpose. On the 3d of December, 1789, Vir- 

15 



226 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

ginia made a similar act of cession, and the two parcels fixed 
upon by Congress, in accordance with these acts, comprised 
the District of Columbia, ten miles square.* And on the 16th 
of July, 1790, Congress passed an act, accepting these cessions, 
and providing that the laws of the two States over their re- 
spective portions of the District should remain in force "until 
the time fixed for the removal of the Government thereto, 
and until Congress shall otherwise by law provide." 

By this wholesale and summary though covert process, the 
Federal Government re-enacted over the Federal District 
those slave laws which, had they not been thus re-enacted, 
would have become inoperative at the very moment the ces- 
sion was accepted, upon the admitted maxim that slavery can 
exist only by force of positive municipal or local law. Yet 
Congress had no more power or authority, under the Consti- 
tution, to make a slave, than it had to establish an order of 
nobility, or create a king. The procedure was a flagrant 
usurpation of power, a violation of the Federal Constitution, 
and the act, so far as the existence of slavery in the Fed- 
eral District is concerned, should be set aside by the Courts 
of the United States, as unconstitutional, null, and void. 

This point is of too much importance to be lightly passed 
over. We will fortify our position by introducing a brief 
outline of an argument in the Speech of Hon. Horace Mann, 
of Massachusetts, in the House of Eepresentatives of the Uni- 
ted States, February 23, 1819. No answer to the argument 
is known to have been attempted. 

We quote only the propositions of Mr. Mann, without the 
luminous illustrations and ample authorities by which he elu- 
cidated and sustained them. But the propositions shine with 
sufficient clearness, in their own light. , 

" I. Shivery has no legal existence unless by force of positive law." 
" 2. A man's legal condition may be changed by a change in the govern- 
ment over him, while he remains in the same place, just as effectually as it 



* The portion west of the Potomac, ceded by Virginia, has recently been retro 
ceded buck again. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 227 

can be changed by his removal to another place, and putting himself under 
another government." 

3. " The jurisdiction under which the inhabitants of what is now the Dis- 
trict of Columbia lived, prior to the cession of the District by Maryland to 
the United States, was utterly and totally changed at the moment of the 
cession — at the moment when, according to the provisions of the Constitu- 
tion, they ceased to be citizens of the State of Maryland, and became citi- 
zens of the District of Columbia." 

4. " Congress, in attempting to re-enact the Maryland laws, to uphold 
slavery in this District, transcended the limits of its constitutional power. 
It acted unconstitutionally. It acted in plain contravention of some of the 
plainest and most obvious principles consecrated by the Constitution. If 
so, no one will dispute that its act is void. I do not deny, then, that Con- 
gress used words of -sufficient amplitude to cover slavery ; but what I deny 
is, that it had any power to give legal force to those words." 

5. " My next proposition therefore, is this : that as Congress can do 
nothing except what it is empowered to do by the Constitution, and as the 
Constitution does not empower it to establish slavery here, it cannot estab- 
lish slavery here, nor continue it." 

The case is plain. There only needs a Granville Sharp to 
press the question before the Federal Courts. Its Blackstones 
and Mansfields, though steeped in prejudice, and fettered by 
precedent, as their English predecessors were, would be forced 
to yield, and the charm of judicial infallibility would be 
broken. 

Kentucky, which had been under the jurisdiction of Vir- 
ginia, was admitted into the Union in 1792, as an independent 
State. This commenced the policy of admitting new slave 
Stales. 

We come next to the law of 1793, under cover of which 
the Federal authorities assist in returning fugitive slaves to 
their masters. 

The Constitution of the United States contains the follow- 
ing provision : 

" No person held to service or labor in one State, under the laws thereof, 
escaping to another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, 
be discharged from such service or labor, but shall be delivered up on 
claim of the party to whom such service or labor may be due." — Art. IV., 
Sect. 2. 

From the mere language of this section, no one would sus- 



228 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

pect that it referred, to slaves. It makes no mention of such 
a class, but very accurately describes the case of apprentices 
and other persons who were under a voluntary contract to 
perform labor, having received an equivalent in advance, and 
being in debt for the same. Strictly construed, it could not 
apply to slaves. 

It speaks of persons: but according to the "laws" of the 
slave States, a slave is not a " person," but a chattel. It 
speaks of persons "held to service or labor," but slave law 
holds no one to "service or labor,"* any more than it does to 
a life of prostitution and idleness. It only holds its victim 
as property — and of reclaiming property the section under 
review says nothing. The clause provides that no " law or 
regulation" of any State shall " discharge" the party owing 
service. It does not say that either the State into which he 
has escaped, or that the United States shall enforce the claim, 
or help carry him back. No " service or labor" can be due 
from a chattel to its proprietor. The slave can owe no debt, 
because he " can form no contract." And were it otherwise, 
and if the State to which he had escaped, or the United States, 
were required to act in the case, it must be an act of adjudi- 
cation between debtor and creditor, in which, after hearing 
both sides, and balancing the "labor" performed against the 
debt " due," a decision would have to be made whether any 
"service or labor" remained "due," or otherwise. 

This is all that can be gathered from the mere language. 
Not only does it fail to describe the case of fugitive slaves, 
but if the provisions of the bill were honestly and rigorously 
applied to them, it would, in most cases, result in their dis- 



* Mr. Madison tells us explicitly, that when the framers of the Constitution used 
the word "service," they were careful to make choice of that term, because it did 
not express the condition of slaves, but of free persons. 

"On motion of Mr. Randolph, the word 'servitude' was struck out, and ' service 1 
unanimously inserted — the former being thought to express the condition of slaves, 
and the latter the obligation of free persons.' 1 '' — Madison Papers, Vol. III., p. 1569. 

How then could they have expected that when they used the word "service,'" 
the people would understand them to mean " servitude ?" But unless the above 
clause does mean " servitude"' and not " service," it cannot mean fugitive slaves ! 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 229 

charge, as nothing would be found " due" from them, even 
admitting that they could sustain the relation of debtors. 

But, as already noticed, the language does describe the case 
of persons owing service or labor, by voluntary contract. 
And there were circumstances that might be supposed to call 
for some such provision at that time, and in the city of Phila- 
delphia, where the Convention was sitting. It was common 
for ship-masters there, in accordance with previous contract, 
to advertise and sell at public auction, whole ship-loads of 
"German redemptioners," as they were called, or emigrant 
laborers. That is, their services were sold for a term of time, 
sufficient to pay for their passage. And this shows, by-the- 
by, that the mere phrases " buying and selling" men, does 
not prove them to be chattel slaves. These " persons held to 
service and labor in one State, under the laws thereof," were 
in the habit, in great numbers, of " escaping to another" State, 
and thus evading the payment of their just dues. This was 
the ground of much complaint, and it would be considered 
proper that they should " be delivered up, on claim of the 
party to whom such service or labor (might) be due." 

And is there the slightest evidence that the people of the 
Northern States, in adopting the Constitution, understood that 
the clause referred to fugitive slaves ?* While the Quakers 

* An unexpected answer to this query comes to hand while we are penning it, in 
a speech of lion. Daniel Webster, in the Senate of the United States, July 17, 1850. 
Alluding to a letter of Gov. Berkeley of Virginia, to Gov. Endicott of Massachusetts, 
in 1644, in which the latter is requested to return some fugitive " lervants," Mr. 
Webster proceeds to say : 

" At that day, I do not suppose there were a great many slaves in Massachusetts, 
but there was an extensive system of apprenticeship, and hundreds of persons were 
lound apprentices in Massachusetts, some of whom would run away. They were ;is 
likely to run away to Virginia as anywhere else ; and in such cases, they were 
returned, upon demand, to their masters. So true is that, that it was found neces- 
sary, in the early laws of Massachusetts, to make provision for the seizure and 
return of runaway apprentices. In all the revisions of our laws, this provision 
remains; and here it is in the revised statutes now before me. It provides that 
runaway apprentices shall be secured upon the application of their masters, or any 
one on their behalf, and put into jail until they can be sent for by their masters ; and 
there is no trial by jury in their case, either." 

A very important and timely distinction of Mr. Webster, unless he means to 
insinuate the identity of " bound apprentices in Massachusetts" with slaves ! 



230 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

of Pennsylvania and Rhode Island, and other friends of free- 
dom, objected so strongly to the twenty years of respite to 
the slave trade (Rhode Island withholding her ratification 
from that clause), is it credible that no complaint would have 
been made against a provision understood to require the 
return of fugitive slaves ? 

In " The Federalist" — by Madison, Jay, and Hamilton — in 
defence of the Federal Constitution,* removing objections, 
and persuading the people to adopt it, Mr. Madison himself 
devotes ample space to a consideration of the objections 
against the apportionment of representation, and the twenty 
years respite to the slave trade, the latter of which Mr. Madi- 
son regrets. Is it credible that he would have omitted to 
notice the clause requiring the return of fugitive slaves, if 
the people had understood that there was such a provision ? 
Could he have passed it by, as he does, in silence? Or, what 
can we imagine he would have said of it, with those memoranda 
in his desk, since published, affirming that the Convention 
unanimously defined the term "service" as applying only to 
"the obligation of free persons" — affirming, also, that, as a 
member of the Convention, he would not " introduce into 
the Constitution the idea that there could be property in 
man.f" 

In the whole volume, of nearly five hundred pages, we have 

Compare this statement with the language of the Constitution, and it is easy to 
see how the good people of Massachusetts (in the absence of any of our more modern 
expositions and uses of that instrument), would be likely to understand the provi- 
sion. "Whatever he may have intended by alluding to these facts, he entirely fails 
to sustain the claims of the slaveholders. He turned their boasted constitutional 
requisition in quite another direction ! He shows us how the people of Massachu- 
setts would have required such a provision if there had been no slaves in the 
country ! 

Another fact, before noticed, becomes particularly interesting in this connection. 
The attentive and thoughtful reader of the preceding history will be very likely, 
just here, to remember that there is no evidence that there were, legally, any 
11 slaves'" in Virginia in 1644, when Gov. Berkeley requested the return of some 
" servants.' 1 ' 1 — See Chapter II. 

* These papers were at the time circulated among the people in the public jour- 
nals, and were afterwards collected into a volume. 

t Madison Papers, Vol. III., pp. 1429-30. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 231 

been unable to detect a single paragraph referring to the sub- 
ject of fugitive slaves, though much space is devoted to an 
enumeration of^the causes and dangers of disagreement be- 
tween the States, and the importance of harmony between 
them. 

These facts are introduced, here, not as forestalling or even 
as discussing the constitutional question involved, but for the 
simple purpose of showing, distinctly and fully, under what 
circumstances the law of 1793 was enacted. 

Six years had now elapsed, since the Constitution had been 
drafted, and four years since it had gone into operation. Du- 
ring all this time there had been no law for returning fugitive slaves. 
as there had been none under the old confederation. There 
had been no public anticipation of such a law — no general un- 
derstanding that the duty of such an enactment devolved on 
the Federal Congress — and, what is still more remarkable — no 
complaints, much less, no loud and boisterous clamors, from 
slaveholders, on account of the absence of such a law. Nor is 
it credible, that at a time when manumissions were so exten- 
sive, and the spirit of liberty and opposition to slavery so 
widely diffused, there were not considerable numbers of success- 
ful escapes, f A female slave of President Washington himself 
is understood to have escaped to New Hampshire, during some 
part of his administration, whether before or after this enact- 
ment we cannot now say. The President, it seems, sent a 
messenger after her, but Gov. Gilman, not having learned his 
ethics from Moses Stuart nor his constitutional expositions 
from Daniel Webster, neglected a fair opportunity to arrest 
her — though apprized of the wishes of the illustrious claimant 
— and even assisted in putting her out of the reach of her pur- 
suers ; an act for which the present Federal courts would have 
subjected him to a heavy fine — a process not to be adventured, 
in those days.* "*s 

Yery possibly it may have been in consequence of some 

* The particulars, which went the rounds of the papers a few years since, were 
taken from the lips of the aged woman herself, who was then living in New Hamp- 
shire. 



232 GKEAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

cases of t]iis description that the slaveholders in Congress intro- 
duced the law of 1793. They seem to have understood the 
tactics of such legislation. The act is couched in language re- 
sembling that of the Constitutional provision already cited. 
Without any direct mention of slaves, it is so framed that a 
court of slaveholders, or those who are appointed by them, 
could make it answer their purpose. It is no new thing for 
those who would " frame mischief by a> law" to cover up their 
designs by ambiguities that the people will not, at first, under- 
stand, and thus prevent opposition and excitement. The con- 
sequence, not unfrequently, is, that the enactment is con- 
structed so loosely, that honest statesmen and jurists, when- 
ever they come upon the stage, will set them aside, as usurpa- 
tions, or as inadequate for the purposes to which they had 
been applied. An example we have, in the acts of Parliament 
under which the slave trade was sheltered, but which Mr. 
Pitt, (as before noticed) declared to be even prohibitory of the 
practice.* 

The enactment now under review bears marks of a similar 
character, and nothing on the face of it would be likely to ex- 
cite general alarm or suspicion. Yet the courts, in due time, 
took care to give it a meaning adverse to freedom ; though 
eminent jurists are beginning to deny the constitutionality of 
some of its provisions, particularly that cardinal feature of it, 
sustained by the Federal Courts, hitherto, by which it assumes 
for Congress, on behalf of the United States, the prerogative of 
providing for the return of fugitive slaves.f 

* The enactments under cover of which the courts have carried on religious 
persecutions, have very commonly been of the same vague and ambiguous charac- 
ter, and for the same reasons. Even the intended victims of such laws have thus 
been quieted and prevented from a timely opposition to them. How important to 
guard the people against such arts ! 

t See Jay's View of the action of the Federal Government in behalf of Slavery, 
p. 30. Since penning the above paragraph, the testimony of an aged and prominent 
citizen has thrown further light on this subject. An "immense meeting" of 
citizens of Boston, for repudiating the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850, was held i'i 
Faneuil Hall, October 14, of the same year. The "call" to this meeting was headed 
by the venerable Josiaii Quincy, formerly Mayor of Boston, and since President of 
Harvard University, Cambridge, " more than four score years of age." In a letter 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 233 

" By the act of 1793, the slaveholder may, himself, without oath or 
process of any kind, seize his prey, where he can find him, and at his 
leisure (for no time is specified), drag him before any justice of the peace, 
in the place, whom he way prefer." " Before this magistrate, who is not 
authorized to compel the attendance of witnesses in such a case, the slave- 
holder brings his victim, and if he can satisfy this judge of his own choice, 
' by oral testimony or affidavit, 1 and, for aught that appears in the law, by 
his own oath, that his claim is well founded, the wretched prisoner is sur- 
rendered to him a slave for life, torn from his wife and children, bereft of 
all the rights of humanity, and converted into a chattel, an article of mer- 
chandize, a beast of burden." — Jay's View, pp. 31-2. 

" The Federal Constitution declares, ' In all suits at common law, where 
the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by 
jury shall be preserved ;' but the act of 1793, in suits in which ' the value 
in controversy' exceeds all estimation, dispenses with trial by jury, and in- 
deed with almost every safeguard of justice and personal liberty." — lb., 
p. 32. 

To suppose that such a statute is constitutional, is to sup- 
pose that the Constitution does not secure our liberties. To 
suppose that it could be legally binding, would be to reverse 
the foundation maxims of universal Common Law, and to 
deny that " Statutes contrary to fundamental morality are 
void." 



addressed to J. I. Bowditch, Esq., and read at the meeting, Mr. Quincy states that 
the law of 1793 excited, from the first, " the surprise and utter disgust" of " every 
class of citizens in Massachusetts," and that " they regarded that law as violating 
the 'principle of the compact, as they understood it, when they acceded to the Constitu- 
tion of the United States.''' 1 He states that in the year 1794, he was sent for to 
defend, as counsellor at law, a slave who had been arrested under this act. In his 
defence, lie " denied the authority of the law of Congress, and of the magistrate 
under it, to deliver an inhabitant of Massachusetts into the custody of another, 
unless after trial by jury according to the constitution of this State." While he 
was speaking, a confusion and loud noise interrupted him, and the alleged slave 
passed out and escaped ! About two weeks after, Rufus Greene Amory, a lawyer 
of eminence, received a letter from the master of the slave, directing him to prose- 
cute Josiah Quincy for obstructing his agent ! Mr. Amory, who showed the letter 
to Mr. Quincy, " felt the folly of the pretense," and Mr. Quincy heard nothing 
more of the prosecution. 

It is said that for many years after the passage of this bill, the owners of fugitive 
slaves seldom, if ever, made use of it, or attempted it, except in the case at Boston. 
Instead of this, they resorted to various stratagems to decoy them. Long after- 
wards, and up to a recent date, the process was a covert one, under pretense of 
arrests for petty thefts. 



234 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

We next glance at the legitimate workings of that manifestly 
unconstitutional act of Congress of 16th of July, 1790, by 
which the Federal Government extended the then expiring 
slave laws of Maryland and Virginia over the District of 
Columbia. 

A Committee of Congress on the District of Columbia, 
reported, 16th July, 1827, that, in the County of Washington, 
ceded by Maryland, 

" If a, free man of color should be apprehended as a runaway, he is sub- 
jected to the payment of &]\fees and rewards given by law for apprehending 
runaways ; and upon failure to make such payment, is liable to be sold as a 
slave ! "* 

" That is" (says Judge Jay), " a man acknowledged to be free, and un- 
accused of any offence, is to be sold as a slave, to pay the fees and rewards 
given by law for apprehending runaways .'" — lb., p. 37. 

The Committee's report further states, " that in the part of the District 
ceded by Virginia, a free negro may be arrested, and put in jail for three 
months, on suspicion of being a fugitive. He is then hired out to pay his 
jail fees, and if he does not prove his freedom within twelve months, is to 
be sold as a slave ! " — lb., p. 36. 

And yet, on hearing this Eeport, Congress made no altera- 
tion of these laws. 

Mr. Jay has further shown how the law offers to the only 
JUDGE, in this case (the Marshal of the District) a high bribe to 
sell men he knows to be free, and thus become a manufacturer of 
slaves/ The proceeds of the sale remain in his pocket, after 
the sale, unless the master of the person arrested appears, and 
claims the balance. — See Jay's Vieiv, p. 35-6. 

All this appears to be under the Maryland act of 1719, May 
session, chap. 2, (as cited by Sunderland, in his Anti-Slavery 
Manual, page 92,) and re-enacted in the manner already no- 
ticed, in 1790, by the Congress of the United States ! 

* That this law is not a dead letter, or an empty abstraction, is" proved by the 
statement of Judge Cranch, and more than one thousand citizens of the District, 
who say, in their petition to Congress in 1828, against the slave trade in the Dis- 
trict, that colored persons entitled to freedom are lodged in jail as runaways, and 
then sold to the traders ! And they narrate a particular instance. — See Sunderland's 
Anti-Slavery Manual, p. 93. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 235 

Another item will indicate the incipient apostacy of that 
period. The Federal Constitution had recognized no distinc- 
tions on account of color. Any attempt, in that direction, 
would have been abortive. In the forming of the Articles of 
Confederation, in 1778, the proposal to introduce the word 
M white" before " inhabitants" had been significantly rejected. 
Now, notice the contrast. 

" So early as 1790, Congress passed an act describing the mode in which 
' any white person' might be naturalized and admitted to the rights of an 
American citizen." — Jay's View, p. 21. 

" Two years after (1792), an act was passed for organizing the militia, 
which was to consist of ' each and every free, able-bodied, white male 
citizen.' " — lb. 

Thus were the free colored population degraded and spurned 
from the national defense. The bad precedent was followed 
by succeeding administrations, in other acts of indignity to- 
ward that class of citizens ; and all at the bidding of slavery. 

In 1796, Tennessee, another Slave State, was admitted into 
the Union. Kentucky has been previously admitted. 

Up to this point we have only traced the action of the 
Federal Government, in behalf of slavery, under the adminis- 
tration of the first President, with some of the direct effects of 
that policy. During this period, we have seen the beginning 
of compromise, servility, and evasion, on the part of the Na- 
tional Congress. We have seen the acceptance of the terri- 
tory constituting Tennessee, on the condition, imposed by 
North Carolina, that it should remain sacred to slavery. We 
have seen the unconstitutional establishment of slavery in the 
District of Columbia, through the re-enactment, by Congress, 
of the Slave Laws of Virginia and Maryland, including the 
authorized sale of free citizen? into slavery, for the payment 
of the expenses of their unwarrantable imprisonment ! We 
have seen the admission into the Union, of two new Slave 
States. We have seen the Constitution again violated, and 
the sacred right of trial by jury cloven down, where the ques- 
tion of freedom and slavery is involved, by the law of 1793, 
for reclaiming fugitive slaves. We have seen the Constitution 



236 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

further violated by the introduction of caste, and the virtual 
establishment of a privileged order, founded on birth, or 
blood, in our naturalization and militia laws. 

And all this, under the administration and with the sanction 
of George Washington, whom we have been taught to con- 
sider the pattern of everything that is republican and chris- 
tian. 

We would gladly cast the veil of oblivion over such facts, 
but they form a part of the public history of our country. 
There they stand, on the imperishable record of the past, 
which we may neither falsify, nor overlook, nor obliterate. 
We must know them, or not understand the history of our 
country. We must ponder them, and judge righteously con- 
cerning them, if we would solve the problem on which is 
suspended our nation's freedom. We are permitted to con- 
sole ourselves with the refreshing remembrance, that Wash- 
ington, by his last Will and Testament, emancipated all his 
slaves at his decease, thus writing his own condemnation and 
recantation of all he had ever done in support of slavery. 
But his oivn condemnation of the wrong, should not silence 
ours. The administration even of Washington exhibits its 
catalogue of national sins, which must be penitently confessed 
and put away, if we would enjoy, as a nation, the forgiveness 
and the blessing of Heaven. Above all, we must learn to 
repudiate the folly, and abhor the impiety of thrusting the 
name or the statue of Washington between the sin of op- 
pressive legislation and the laws of the most High God. As 
well might we set up the graven image of any other national 
idol as to set up his.* 



* It might serve to correct our extravagant adulation of Washington, Jefferson, 
and our other national idols, if we would rememher their almost violent opposition 
to each other, as the heads of rival parties, criticising and even criminating each 
other, quite as eagerly as their successors have ever done. By some of the jour- 
nalists supporting Mr. Jefferson, the retirement of Washington was hailed as a 
national deliverance. On the other hand, the zealous partizaus of Washington and 
Adams regarded the elevation of Jefferson as a great public calamity, preached ser- 
mons to prevent it, and fasted and lamented when it took place. We have no occa- 
sion to renew those contentions, which became personal and bitter between the first 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 237 



CHAPTER XX. 

SUBSEQUENT ACTION OF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT — COLORED 
PEOPLE — SLAVE TERRITORY — NEW SLAVE STATES — FEDERAL 
DISTRICT. 

Cession of Georgia and South Carolina— Mississippi Territory— Admission of Ken- 
tucky, Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi — Missouri— Purchase of Louisiana and 
Florida— Four more Slave States— Missouri Compromise — Instances of prohibiting 
Slavery— Government of the Federal District— A great Slave mart— Testimony of 
a Grand Jury of the District (1802)— Of Judge Morrell (1816)— John Randolph 
and Alexandria Gaz. (1827)— Petition of Judge Cranch and others (1828)—" Wash. 
Spectator" (1830)— Insecurity of Northern Citizens— Crandall, Chaplin, &c. 

Having traced the beginnings of our national declension, 
we must proceed with the remaining part of the history. The 
whole might almost be read, by anticipation, from the germ 
already examined. No subsequent administration, amid all 
our fluctuations of national policy, has run counter to the pro- 
slavery precedent furnished by the first. 

I The insult to colored citizens, commenced by the naturaliza- 
tion and militia laws, under the administration of Washington, 
was renewed and extended by the law organizing the Post 
Office Department, under Mr. Madison, in 1810, providing 
that " no other than a free white person shall be employed 
in carrying the mail of the United States, either as a post 
rider or driver of a carriage carrying the mail," under a pen- 
alty of fifty dollars. — Jay's View, p. 24. v ; 

two Virginian Presidents. We may admire much in the one and in the other, but 
we must be indeed stupid to regard them infallible, or shipwreck our liberties in 
order to follow them implicitly, or revise or throw away, our Bibles and declarations 
of self-evident truths, in order to avoid seeing their inconsistencies, or in deference 
to the imaginary and immaculate saintship of either of them. 



238 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

In 1820, under Mr. Monroe, Congress authorized the white 
citizens of Washington to elect white city officers ! These 
white officers were authorized "to prescribe the terms on 
which free negroes and mulattoes may reside in the city," and 
they exercised this absurd and wicked authority in the very 
spirit in which was conferred. — lb. p. 25-26. 

SLAVE TERRITORIES AND NEW SLAVE STATES. 

Slavery under jurisdiction of Congress, and commencing 
under the administration of Washington, has been continued 
ever since. Not only in the District of Columbia has this 
been done, but in Territories belonging to the United States, 
has the institution been fostered, preparatory to the admission 
of them as new Slave States into the Union. 

In 1802, Georgia ceded to the United States the country lying between 
her present western limit and the Mississippi, stipulating that the Ordinance 
of 1787, in all its provisions, should extend to the ceded territory, " that 
article only excepted which forbids slavery." This cession was accepted, 
and the territory placed under a Territorial Government, restricted from all 
interference with slavery.''' 1 — Speech of S. P. Chase, U. S. Senate, March 
26, 1850. 

This was under the administration and with the concurrence 
of Mr. Jefferson, author of the Notes on Virginia, the De- 
claration of Independence, and the Ordinance of 1787. This 
added, in due time, the two Slave States of Mississippi and 
Alabama, to " our glorious Union !" The former was admit- 
ted in 1817, and the latter in 1819, both under the adminis- 
tration of Mr. Monroe. 

Thus it appears that since the adoj)tion of the Federal 
Constitution, in 1789, we have admitted into the Union the 
four Slave States of Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama, and 
Mississippi, from territory within our original limits ; and, 
except in the case of Kentucky, the National Government 
has previously protected slavery in them, while exercising 
authority over them, as territories, previous to their admis- 
sion into the Union as independent states. 

But this is not alh The national resources have been ex- 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 239 

pended to purchase new territory for the erection and admis- 
sion of new Slave States. 

In 1803, we acquired Louisiana by purchase from the French Republic* 
There were at that time about forty thousand slaves held within its limits, 
under the French law. The treaty contained this stipulation : 

" The inhabitants of the ceded territory shall be incorporated in the 
Union of the United States, and admitted as soon as possible, according to 
the principles of the Federal Constitution, to the enjoyment of all the 
rights, advantages, and immunities of citizens of the United States ; and, 
in the meantime, they shall be maintained in the free enjoyment of their 
liberty, property, and the religion which they profess." — 8 Stat, at Large, 
U. S., 202. 

This stipulation, interpreted according to the plain sense of its terms, 
and carried into practical effect, would have enfranchised every slave in 
Louisiana ; for no one, I apprehend, will venture to affirm that the slaves 
were not inhabitants. Independently of this stipulation, it was the duty of 
the Government — even more imperative than in 1787, for since then the 
whole country south of the Ohio and east of the Mississippi had been 
formed into slave States and slave Territories — to establish freedom as 
the fundamental law of the new acquisition. But this duty was not per- 
formed. There was some feeble legislation against the introduction of 
slaves from foreign countries, and of slaves imported since 1798 from the 
other States ; but that was all, and that was useless. — Speech of S. P. 
Chase, U. S. Senate, March 26, 1850. 

This, too, was under the administration of Mr. Jefferson. 
The purchase was, with him, a favorite measure, and it is 
not known to the writer that he proposed the abolition of 
the slavery existing there. So strong were his impressions, 
at one time, that the purchase transcended the Constitutional 
powers of the Federal Government, that he contemplated 
recommending an amendment to the Constitution for that 
special object, but he finally persuaded himself that the people 
were so desirous of the purchase that the formality of an 
amendment might be waived ! 

Then came the cession of Florida by Spain in 1819. The stipulation in 
the treaty was substantially the same as in the treaty with France ;f the 



* This was at a cost to the nation of fifteen millions of dollars. 
+ 8 U. S. Stat, at Large, 256, as quoted by Mr. Chase. 



240 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

duty of the Government in respect to the acquisition was the same ; and 
there was the same failure to perform it. 

Finally, Texas came in, in 1845, not as a Territory, but as a State. — 
S. P. Chase, as above. 

The purchase of Florida, for the sum of five millions of 
dollars, was under the administration of Mr. Monroe. The 
annexation of Texas was under that of Mr. Tyler. 

The purchase of Louisiana resulted in the admission of three 
new Slave States, formed out of the purchased territory, viz : 
Louisiana, admitted under the administration of Mr. Madi- 
son, in 1812 ; Missouri, (after much debate, and a so called 
"compromise") under Mr. Monroe, in 1821; and Arkansas, 
under General Jackson, in 1836. Florida was admitted under 
Mr. Tyler, March 3, 1845. 

The dates and the names of the Presidents show the con- 
tinuity of the policy, during the long lapse of time, and under 
the successive administrations of the Government. 

The contest concerning the admission of Missouri as a slave 
state, occurred during the Congressional session of 1819-20, 
and was decided in March, 1820. The proposal for the 
admission of Missouri, was artfully coupled with a pro- 
posal for the admisson of Maine, a free state. It was con- 
tended that the one was an equitable balance for the other. 
But this plea did not satisfy the North. The "compromise " 
consisted in the introduction of a provision that in the future 
admission of States from the residue of that territory, the 
line of division between slavery and freedom should be the 
parallel of 36° 30' North latitude, the northern side of that 
line being appropriated to freedom. This proposal was resisted 
manfully for a time, but under a threat of dissolving the 
Union, it was carried by a small majority in the House. But 
the vote fixing the conditions of the future admission of a 
State could not bind a future Congress, so that the "compro- 
mise," as usual, gave the South all, and the North nothing. 
Four new slave states from our original territory, four 
more from territory acquired by purchase, and one from an- 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 241 

nexation, make nine added in all, to the dominion of slavery, 
and to the strength of the Slave Power. 

It is proper to record here, the instances of Federal legisla- 
tion of an opposite character. 

Bv the 7th section of the act organizing a Territorial Government for 
Mississippi, passed in 1798,* the importation of slaves into said Territory 
from any place without the United States, was prohibited under severe 
penalties. This was ten years before Congress had the power, under the 
Constitution, to prohibit the importation of slaves into the States. — Speech 
of Mr. Bingham, of Michigan, in Congress, June 4, 1850, Nat. Era, 
July 18. 

This was under the administration of John Adams. 

On the 7th of May, 1800, an act was passed for the organization of a 
territorial Government for Indiana, and slavery expressly prohibited therein. 

This act was approved by John Adams. 

January 11, 1805, the northern part of Indiana was erected into the ter- 
ritory of Michigan, and slavery prohibited. February 3, 1809, the Terri- 
tory of Illinois was established, with the like prohibition as to slavery. 
These two latter acts received the approval and signature of Thomas- 
Jefferson. 

On the 20th of April, 1336, Wisconsin was organized as a Territory. 
and slavery prohibited within its limits. This act was approved by General 
Jackson. 

The Territory of Iowa was established by act of Congress of the 12th 
of June, 1838, under the administration of Mr. Van Buren ; and here also 
was slavery prohibited. 

On the 14th of August, 184S, the Territory of Oregon was organized, 
which contained the same provision in the memorable and time-honored 
words, " there shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude therein, 
except for the punishment of crime." — lb. 

This was under the administration of Mr. Polk. 

These acts concerning Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin, Iowa 
and Oregon, were only in pursuance of the Ordinance of 
1787, yet they are so many attestations to the Constitution- 

* This territory, organized in 179S, comprised only a region of country ceded by 
South Carolina, but was afterwards, in 1804, enlarged, so as to include a part of the 
country ceded by Georgia in 1802, as stated by Hon. S. P. Chase, in his speech 
before quoted. This statement will explain an apparent, but not real discrepancy 
in dates, in tbo two quotations. 

1G 



242 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

ality of that measure, and the consequent poiver of Congress 
to prohibit slavery in the Territories of the United States. 

The same principle was likewise involved, and recognized, 
in the act, before noticed, for authorizing the admission of 
Missouri, in 1820, containing, as it did, a clause " to prohibit 
slavery in certain territories" that is, in all the Louisiana pur- 
chase North of 36° 30' North latitude. 

And there had been a previous recognition of that princi- 
ple, in its application to a part of the same purchase. 

By the act of the 26th of March, 1804, that part of Louisiana south of 
the Territory of Mississippi was organized into a Territorial Government, 
by the name of Orleans. By this act, the importation into said Territory 
of slaves from abroad was prohibited, and also the importation of any slave 
from within the United States who should have been brought into the 
country since the 1st of May, 1798, or who should thereafter be brought 
into the United States. It further provided that no slave should be brought 
into said Territory, except by a citizen of the United States, who should 
remove there for actual settlement, and who should at the time be the bona 
fide owner of such slave ; thus directly interdicting the domestic as well as 
the foreign slave trade in this Territory of Orleans. This act was ap- 
proved by Jefferson. — Speech of Mr. Bingham. 

When President Monroe was about to give his signature 
to the Missouri act of 1820, he required each member of his 
Cabinet, (the Heads of Departments and Attorney General,) 
to give their opinions in writing, on the questions whether 
the act was consistent with the Constitution, and whether 
" Congress has a right, under the powers vested in it, by the 
Constitution, to make a regulation prohibiting slavery in a 
Territory?" All the members of the Cabinet, including the 
late John C. Calhoun and John Quincy Adams, gave written 
answers in the affirmative. This is proved by the diary of 
J. Q. Adams. — See Speech of T. H. Benton, at Jefferson City, 
Mo., May 26, 18-49, in New York Evening Post, June 14, 
1849. 

The Federal Government, then, in establishing and foster- 
ing slavery in the Territories, has done so ivith the full Jcnoiu- 
ledge of its Constitutional power to prohibit it. The moral and 
political responsibility, therefore, rests upon it. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 243 

Another circumstance connected with the admission of Mis- 
souri deserves notice. 

The act of Congress authorizing the people of Missouri to 
form a Constitution, preparatory to admission, was passed in 
March, 1820. The State Constitution, presented at the next 
Congress, contained a clause " to prevent free negroes and mu- 
lattoes from coming to and settling in this State, under any pre- 
text whatever" As this provision was contrary to the Con- 
stitution of the United States, which secures " to the citizens 
of each state all the rights and immunities of citizens in the 
several states," (many of the states having colored citizens) Con- 
gress passed an act, in March, 1821, authorizing the President 
to admit Missouri, on condition that said clause should not be 
so construed as to exclude citizens of any other Staies>- Mis- 
souri complied with the conditions, and by proclamation of 
the President, was admitted, August 10, 1821. [See Speech 
of T. H. Benton, at Jefferson City, May 26, 1849.] 

This instance of the supervision by the Federal Govern- 
ment, over the Constitution of a State asking admission, and 
in a point touching the rights of " negroes and mnlattoes" 
involves important principles, and may be of use as a prece- 
dent, hereafter. 

GOVERNMENT OF THE FEDERAL DISTRICT. 

The District of Columbia is under the exclusive jurisdic- 
tion of the Federal Government. In another connection we 
have shown how that Government was administered at the 
beginning, and so far as the condition of things there could 
be traced directly to the act of Congress of 1790. We then 
saw/ree colored citizens, on suspicion of being fugitives from 
slavery, thrown into jail, and then sold into slavery with their 
posterity forever, for the payment of their jail fees — the ex- 
penses of their causeless arrest ! We will now look again at 
the continuance of that enormity, in its connection with the 
domestic slave trade, systematically carried on in the District. 

From a number of causes, the Federal District has been, at 



214 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

some periods, tlie principal slave mart in America. The 
policy of Virginia and Maryland has, at times, forbidden the 
traders to bring in slaves from other States, and expose them 
for sale, while the Federal District, under the policy of Con- 
gress, has been under no such restriction. The fact that the 
District is the resort of citizens from all the states, including 
Senators and Eepresentatives,' who may desire to buy or sell 
slaves, has given it an advantage over other slave markets, 
which has been eagerly improved. 

As early as 1802, the grand jury of Alexandria complained 
of this traffic as a grievance demanding legislative interfer- 
ence. In 1816, Judge Morrell, of the U. S. Circuit Court, 
took notice of the nuisance, in his charge to the grand jury 
of Washington. The same year, John Kandolph, of Virginia, 
himself a slaveholder, moved, in the House of Eepresenta- 
tives, for a committee to inquire into the "inhuman and illegal 
traffic."* The Alexandria Gazette, of June 22, 1827, described, 
in terms of just abhorrence, the scenes witnessed in connec- 
tion with the traffic. In 1828, a petition, headed by Judge 
Cranch, and signed by more than one thousand citizens of 
the Federal District, was presented to Congress, imploring its 
interference. In 1830, the Washington Spectator described the 
traffic, and exclaimed, " Where is the O'Connell in this Repub- 
lic that will plead for the emancipation of the District of 
Columbia?" 

Merchants of large capital engaged in the lucrative busi- 
ness, with their establishments in Alexandria and Washington 
City, and advertised, " Cash for five hundred negroes," with 
as much coolness as if they were so many horses ! Franklin 
& Armfield, Alexandria, J. W. Neal & Co,, Washington, Win. 
H. Williams, George Hephart, William H. Richards, &c, are 
or have been among the number of these. Some of them 
have had large prison-houses built for the purpose ; and some- 



* This traffic is doubtless as " legal" as any part of the system. Henry Clay, in 
liia famous speeoh in the U. S. Senate, in 1839, declared the traffic inseparable from 
the tenure of slave property. But here we find John Randolph declaring the traffio 
" illegal /" Was he in error ? 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 245 

times the public jails, built by money appropriated by Con- 
gress, have been put to the same infamous use. Large vessels 
were advertised and employed to transport slaves to New 
Orleans. 

One dealer advertised for " any number of young and likely 
negroes from eight to forty years of age." As a general fact, 
little or no regard is paid, either in the purchase or the sale 
to the sanctities of the family relation, which, in fact, the laws 
and the usages of the system do not recognize as existing at 
all ! Yet all this, says Judge Jay, is " in virtus of authority 
delegated by Congress," and he cites his authority. 

" The 2-19th page of the laws of the city of Washington, is polluted by 
the following enactment, bearing date 28th of July, 1831 : 

" For a license to trade or traffic in slaves, for profit, four hundred dol- 
lars.'' — Jay's View, p. 87. 

The petitioners of 1828, before mentioned, including Judge 
Cranch, express themselves in the following language : 

" While the laws of the United States denounce the foreign slave trade 
as piracy, and punish with death those who are found engaged in its perpe- 
tration, there exists in this District, the seat of the Federal Government, a 
domestic slave trade, scarcely less disgraceful in its character, and even 
more demoralizing in its influence. The people are, without their con- 
sent, torn away from their homes ; husband and wife are frequently sepa- 
rated, and sold into distant parts ; children are taken from their parents, 
without regard to the ties of nature, and the most endearing bonds of affec- 
tion are broken forever. Nor is this traffic confined to those who are legally 
slaves for life. Some who are entitled to freedom, and many who have 
a limited time to serve, are sold into unconditional slavery, and, owing to 
the defectiveness of our laws, they are generally carried out of the Dis- 
trict before the necessary steps can be taken for their release." — " The 
people of the District have, within themselves, no means of legislative 
redress, and we appeal to your honorable body as the ONLY ONE vested 
by the American Constitution with power to relieve us." 

But that "honorable body" — a controlling majority of whom 
were from the non-slaveholding States — found other business, 
it would seem, more to their taste, than the granting of the 
prayer of these petitioners ! Yet this was under the adminis- 
tration of a northern President (John Quincy Adams), whose 



246 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

power of appointment, assuredly, could not have been a rod 
over the heads of northern aspirants, as is commonly the case. 
Could there have been a fear, among rival partisans, that an 
agitation of "the delicate question" might affect the elec- 
tions ? 

The liberties of Northern citizens are not secure in the 
Federal District, "under exclusive jurisdiction of Congress." 
In 1835, Dr. Reuben Crandall, from the State of New York, 
was arrested, imprisoned, and tried for his life, in Washington 
City, for having loaned to a white citizen, at his own request, 
a pamphlet against slavery. In 1850, Gen. Wm. L. Chaplin, 
from the same State, was arrested by the authorities of Wash- 
ington City, on the charge of assisting fugitives. While we 
are now writing, two citizens of free States, Messrs. Drayton 
and Say re, are incarcerated in the jails of the Federal Dis- 
trict, for the alleged crime of having assisted* certain citizens 
of that District to emigrate, in "pursuit of happiness," to 
another portion of the country, and enjoy "all the rights and 
immunities of citizens in the" "States" of their intended 
residence. 



* More correctly, perhaps, we might say, " On suspicion of having intended to 
assist ;" for the vessel in which these emigrants took passage was found, and the 
arrest was made, in the waters of Maryland, the very State under whose laws they 
were claimed to be held ! 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 247 



CHAPTER XXI. 

FURTHER ACTION OF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT — AMERICAN 
SLAVE TRADE — AFRICAN SLAVE TRADE. 

Slave trade between the States, under jurisdiction of Congress— Its nature and 
extent— Testimony of T. J. Randolph— Niles' Register— Natchez Courier— Vir- 
ginia Times— Virginia Exports— U. S. Gazette— Prof. Andrews— Prof. Dew— C. F. 
Mercer— Mr. Gholston— H. Clay— Negro Speculation of 1837— Mississippi Imports 
—Northern losses by Southern bankruptcy— Funds of the Prcsb. Church— Ship- 
ments from Federal District— Acts of Congress regulating the traffic— Brig Comet 
—Brig Encomium— The Enterprise— Negotiations with Great Britain for payment 
for Slaves— Case of the Brig Creole— of the Schooner Amistad. African Slave 
Trade, though abolished, connived at— Duplicity in Negotiations with G. Britain 
—Refusal to take effective measures for suppression — Negotiations with Republic 
of Colombia— Deceptive Act declaring the trade piracy— A plan of the Virginia 
Slave-breeders— Connected with the project of Colonization— Notice of various 
Acts of Congress concerning the Slave trade— 1794, 1800, 1803, 1807, 1809, 1818, 
1819, 1820 — Allowed enslavement by Louisiana, of slaves known to have been 
illegally imported— The abuse founded on an Act of Congress— No instance of 
a slave trader being punished with death, according to law. La Coste convicted 
by Judge Storv^ but pardoned by President Monroe. 

The slave trade in the District of Columbia is only a part 
of that detestable traffic carried on under the Federal juris- 
diction. The slave trade between the States is under the 
same jurisdiction, for " Congress shall have power to regulate com- 
merce with foreign nations and among the several States" — U. S. 
Constitution, Art. L, Sect. 8, Clause 3.* 



* The legislative acts of some of the slave States, prohibiting, from considerations 
of local policy, the importation of slaves from other States, have been set aside, if 
we mistake not, by their own courts, as unconstitutional, on the ground that tho 
regulation of inter-State commerce devolves upon the Federal and not tho State 
Governments. 



248 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

Of the nature and extent of that traffic, we will present a 
few particulars. 

In the Legislature of Virginia, in 1832, Thomas Jefferson Randolph 
declared that " the State had been converted into one grand menagerie, 
where men are reared for the market, like oxen for the shambles." 

Comparing the foreign with the domestic slave trade, he 
says: 

" The African trader receives the slave, a stranger in aspect, language, 
and manners, from the merchant who brought him from the interior. But 
here, sir, individuals whom the master has known from infancy, whom he has 
seen sporting in the innocent gambols of childhood, who have been accus- 
tomed to look up to him for protection, he tears from the mother's arms, 
and sends into a strange country, among a strange people, subject to cruel 
task-masters. In my opinion, it is much worse." — A. S. Lecturer. 

No historian need seek a higher authority for his statements 
than the "Register" of the late Hezekiah Niles, of Baltimore, 
and, indeed, few books of history are equally authentic and 
trustworthy. Hear Mr. Niles : 

" Dealing in slaves has become a large business. Establishments are 
made, at several places in Maryland and Virginia, at which they are sold 
like cattle. These places of deposit are strongly built, and,^e'll supplied 
with iron thumb-screws and gags, and ornamented with cou-ffljfm. and other 
whips, oftentimes bloody." — Niles'' Register, Vol. XXXV., pf^.> 

" According to New Orleans papers, there were imported into Vhat port 
during the week commencing on the 16th ult., from all ports of the United 
States, .'!71 slaves, principally from Virginia." — lb., Oct. x^fel^ill. 

"It was stated in the Natchez Courier that during the year 1836 no less 
than two hundred and fifty thousand slaves were carried into Mississippi, 
Alabama, Louisiana, and Arkansas." — Sunderland's A. S. Manual, p. 117; 
also An. Report Am. A. S. Soc, 1837. 

At an average price of $600, this would amount to one 
hundred and fifty millions of dollars. This was a year of 
unprecedented activity in the domestic slave trade. 

The Virginia Times proposed that the banking capital of 
the State be increased, from the money brought into the State 
from the sale of slaves. The editor said : 

" We have heard intelligent men estimate the numJflr of slaves exported 
from Virginia within the last twelve months at 120,000, each slave averaging 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 249 

at least $600 — making au aggregate of ^72,000,000. Of the number of 
slaves exported, not more than oue-third have been sold (the others having 
been carried by their owners who have removed), which would leave in the 
State the sum of $24, 000,000 arising from the sale of slaves."* — An. Rep. 
Am. A. S. Soc, 1837. 

Iii January, 18-10, a correspondent of the U. S. Gazette, who 
signed "Spectator," and whose accuracy the editor vouched 
for, gave an account of the speculations in negroes in 1835-6 
and '37, in which he said: 

" In three years the slave population of Mississippi increased from 70,000 
to 160,000 slaves, at an average cost of at least $1000 each, making the 
debt, for slaves alone, in three years, swell to $90,000,000. "f — A. S. 
Almanac, 1816. 



* The winding up of the business, however, left little to increase the capital of 
the Virginia banks. The slave traders and Southern purchasers swindled the Vir- 
ginians out of a large part of it. The courts of Mississippi, under their State laws, 
decided that the importations into that State had been illegal, and so the Mississippi 
purchaser on credit got his supply of slaves for nothing ! Virginia took the insult 
very quietly, without a single threat of "dissolving the Union," and made ample 
reprisals, by stretching her now swollen credit, in lavish expenditures, to double 
the amount, with the dough-face merchants and bankers of Philadelphia and New 
York, for whieh she paid them less than ten cents on a dollar, in return for their 
pro-slavery riots and the burning of Pennsylvania Hall ! Such are the gains of the 
wicked, and such are their friendships ! Whether the Virginian bankruptcy, at the 
time of this reaction, was artificial or inevitable — a question once mooted — the loss 
to the North was the same. The treasury of the whole conspiracy, indeed, North- 
ern and Southern, was "a bag with holes," as even the Trustees of the Presbyterian 
Church found, to their cost. [See next note.] 

t Hereby hang some other thrilling items of history. This negro speculation, 
growing out of or connected with a previous cotton speculation, had its reaction, 
involving the negro importing and negro raising States, together with the principal 
Northern commercial and manufacturing cities that trade with the South, in a gen- 
eral and overwhelming bankruptcy, in which all concerned, except the skive traders, 
shared together. The slave purchasers failed, and the slavers secured themselves 
by " deeds in trust and mortgages upon nearly the whole property of the State of 
Mississippi." (In other States, similar operations were witnessed.) The planters 
failed, the Southern banks failed, the Southern merchants failed, their Philadelphia 
and New York creditors failed. New York City alone lost about one hundred 
millions of dollars, the little manufacturing town of Newark, N. J., five millions, 
and so on ! Capitalists all over the country lost by the Southern banks, which had 
offered a bribe of high interest for funds wherewith to facilitate this delectable 
" commerce among the several States !" Among the rest, and richly deserving it, 
was " the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church,'''' whose funds, to the 
amount of §94,692 88 (a part of it piously and conscientiously withdrawn from the 



250 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

Such are a few specimens of the " commerce among the several 
/States," which, by the Constitution of the United States, 
" Congress shall have 'power to regulate. 1 ' Not a little of it was 
carried on, under its own eye, in the Federal District, the 
slaves being brought in there for sale and shipment from the 
adjoining States. 

"Franklin and Armfield, (Alexandria, D. C.) alone, shipped to New Or- 
leans, during the year 1835, according to their own statement, not less than 
a thousand slaves. They owned hrigs of about 160 to 200 tons burthen, 
running regularly, every thirty days, during the trading season, to New 
Orleans, and carrying about one slave to the ton." — Sunderland" 1 s A. S. 
Manual, p. 112. 

Professor Andrews, in his work on " the domestic slave trade," repeats a 
conversation he had with a slave trader on board a steamboat in the Potomac, 
(1835), in which the trader informed him, " children from one to eighteen 
months old are now worth about one hundred dollars." — Page 147. 

Professor Dew, afterward President of William and Mary College, in his 
review of the debates on slavery in the Virginia Legislature, 183 l-'2, speak- 
ing of the revenue arising from the domestic trade, says, " a full equivalent 
being thus left in the place of the slave, this immigration becomes an advan- 
tage to the State, and does not check the black population as much as at 
first we might imagine, because it furnishes every inducement to the master 
to attend to the negroes, to encourage breeding, and to cause the greatest 
number possible to be raised. * * Virginia is in fact a negro-raising 
State for other States." 

Mr. Charles Fenton Mercer asserted in the Virginia Convention, (1829) : 
" The tables of the natural growth of the slave population demonstrate, when 
compared with the increase of its numbers in the Commonwealth for twenty 
years past, that an annual revenue of not less than a million and a half of 

Sabbath-breaking Hackensack Bridge Company, N. J.), were invested in the South- 
western batiks engage J in this "patriarchal" operation, which, on the coast of 
Africa, would have been "piracy /" The bottom line of the loss of the Presbyte- 
rian Church, in May 1842, was estimated at $6S,893 88. The documentary state- 
ments may be found in the A. S. Almanac, New York, 1846. It turns out that this 
"successful operation" "to increase the revenues of the Church" had been gone into 
just before the celebrated Pittsburg meeting of the General Assembly, in 1836, at 
which meeting the Trustees reported their doings in this matter, to the great edifica- 
tion of that body, who must have felt a double interest in the adoption, at that same 
meeting, of Dr. Miller's Report, and the circulation of Dr. Hodge's biblical argu- 
ment, both in favor of the "peculiar institution," in which their Church funds were 
to be so profitably employed! Thus rapidly, upon the heels of recreancy, tro Jo 
retribution ! Thus the Church guides the community, and both fall into the ditch, 
yet both grope on, in darkness, still. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 251 

dollars is derived from the exportation of a part of this population." — De- 
bates, p. 90. 

[ Mr. Gholson, when in the Virginia Legislature, 18th January, 1831, 
claimed the right of" the owner of brood marcs to their product, and of the 
owner of female slaves to their increase ;" and added, M the legal maxim of 
1 partus sequitur ventrem' is coeval with the existence of the right of pro- 
perty itself, and is founded in wisdom and justice. It is on the justice and 
inviolability of this maxim that the master foregoes the service of a female 
slave — has her nursed and attended during the period of her gestation, and 
raises the helpless infant offspring. The value of the property justifies the 
expense ; and I do not hesitate to say that in its increase consists much of 
our wealth." It is no wonder this same gentleman was anxious for the an- 
nexation of Texas, declaring that " he believed the., acquisition of Texas 
would raise the price of slaves fifty per cent, at least." \ 

Hon. Henry Clay, of Kentucky, in 1829, delivered afi address before tho 
Kentucky Colonization Society. After showing that when the option ex- 
isted of employing free or slave labor, the first was the most profitable, he 
remarked — " It is believed that nowhere in the farming portion of the United 
States would slave labor be generally employed, if the proprietor were not 
tempted to raise slaves by the high price of the Southern market, which keeps 
it up in his own." 

We might go into the details of the Virginia trade, and show the barbari- 
ties and loss of life which attend it, but we forbear, and content ourselves 
with notices of two dealers in a single town in South Carolina. John 
Wood, of Hamburgh advertised that " he has on hand a likely parcel of Vir- 
ginia negroes, and receives new supplies every fifteen days." John Davis, 
of the same place, advertised for sale, from Virginia, " one hundred and 
twenty likely young negroes of both sexes," and among them " small girls 
suitable for nurses, and several small boys without their mothers."* 

If any one is disposed to doubt that this slave trade between 
the States, as well as that from the Federal District, is under 
the control, regulation, and supervision of the Federal Govern- 
ment, a few matters of fact will not only settle that question, 
but show how this " commerce among the several States" has 
been hitherto " regulated" and protected. 

By act of Congress, March 2, 1807, Congress prohibited the 
coastwise slave trade, in vessels of under forty tons burthen. 
This exercise of the power of prohibition shows that it exists, 
and that Congress is conscious of its existence. The silence of 

* Communication signed A. B., in National Era, Aug. 22, 1850. 



252 GEEAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

the slaveholders and slave traders under this exercise of that 
power is a sufficient evidence that they understood it to be 
legitimate and constitutional. And, undoubtedly, the authority 
to prohibit a traffic, in vessels of under forty tons burthen, im- 
plies an authority to prohibit it in vessels of over forty tons 
burthen. But this is not all. 

By the same act, masters of vessels, of over forty tons bur- 
then, intending to transport slaves, are required to make out 
duplicate manifests of their human cargoes, one of which is to 
be deposited with the Collector of the port; who is to furnish 
the master with a " permit" — "authorizing him to 'proceed to 
the port of destination /" — See Jay's View, p. 90-91. 

Without this "permit" " o.uthorizing" the coastwise slave 
trade, and issued by an officer of the United States, under di- 
rections of a special act of Congress, this species of "commerce 
among the several States" cannot be carried on at all. On the 
arrival of the slaver to his port of destination, he must more- 
over, have another " permit" from another United States' Col- 
lector, before he may land a single slave. Thus notoriously 
is this detestable "commerce among the several States" di- 
rectly " authorized" by the National Congress. And if Con- 
gress wishes to discontinue this policy, it has only to extend 
to "vessels of forty tons burthen" and upward, the prohibition 
oftheactof 1807. 

Instead of this, the National Government not only " per- 
mits" and "authorizes" the American slave trade, but prosti- 
tutes its foreign diplomacy to the shameless purpose of shel- 
tering and protecting it. The evidences are at hand. 

In 1831 the brig Comet, a regular slaver from the Federal 
District for New Orleans was wrecked off the island of Abaco, 
and the slaves carried into New Providence. In 1833, the 
brig Encomium, a slaver from Charleston for New Orleans was 
also wrecked near the same place, and the slaves carried into 
the same port. In 1835, the Enterprise, another slaver from 
the District for Charleston, was driven into Bermuda in dis- 
tress. In each of these cases, the slaves, instead of being 
accounted cargoes of brute beasts, were regarded by the inhab- 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 253 

itants and the authorities of the British provinces as passen- 
gers — human beings — treated with hospitality, and suffered to 
go where they pleased. They were free, and their pretended 
owners were neither assisted nor permitted to re-capture them. 
All this was in accordance with the usages of civilized nations, 
and with that English Common Law upon which our pilgrim 
fathers had reposed, and which they claimed as their heritage. 
Prompt measures were, however, taken by the Federal Gov- 
ernment to demand of the British Government the market 
value of these cargoes of " Native Americans /" 

This was under the administration of Andrew Jackson. 
Instructions on the subject to our Minister at the Court of 
St. James, were sent from Washington, in 1831. Another 
dispatch was forwarded in 1832, and a third in 1833. Fresh 
instructions were sent in 183-4, 1835, and 1836. The claim 
was importunately urged by the Secretary of State, in 1832, 
as a matter which " must be brought to a conclusion." In 
1836, our Minister was reminded that "in the present state 
of our diplomatic relations with the Government of His Bri- 
tanic Majesty, the most immediately 2^essing of the matters 
with which the United States Legation at London is now 
charged, is the claim of certain American citizens against 
Great Britain, for a number of slaves wrecked in British Isl- 
ands in the Atlantic." Thus instructed, Mr. Stevenson, our 
Minister, in a communication to Lord Palmerston, went so far 
as to hint that a further neglect to satisfy this demand, might 
u possibly tend to disturb and weaken the kind and amicable rela- 
tions now so happily subsisting between the two countries. 11 

In plain English, it might involve the two nations in 
war! 

This negotiation was made public by the President, in re- 
sponse to a call from the Senate, in Feb., 1837, for " a copy 
of the correspondence with the Government of Great Britain 
in relation to the outrage committed on our flag," &c, "by 
seizing the slaves on board the brig 'Encomium' and 'Enter- 
prise,' engaged in the coasting trade!" &c. &c. — See Jay's Vieio, 
p. 53-63. 



254 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

" We, the people of the United States," are thus made to 
support a Minister in London, at a cost of nine thousand 
dollars outfit, and nine thousand per annum salary, to nego- 
tiate matters, "the most immediately pressing' 1 '' of which is, to 
protect the American slave trade ! To do this by demanding 
pay of the British Government for slaves liberated by the 
good Providence of God ! To demand this, as if at the point 
of the bayonet, and with the implied threat of war ! 

Who, then, is responsible for this infernal traffic, if not the 
Federal administrations who carry on such negotiations, and 
the people of the free states who sustain them in it by their 
votes ? 

Another illustration presents itself in the 

CASE OF THE CREOLE : 

" Nov. 7, 1841, the American brig Creole, bound from Richmond, Va., 
to New Orleans, with a cargo of 102 slaves, was seized by 19 of the slaves, 
and carried into Nassau, New Providence, one of the British West India 
islands. One passenger was killed, and the captain and a few others 
wounded. The whole affair was managed with a remarkable degree of 
bravery, discretion, and mercy. Every movement indicated an earnest 
desire to do as little mischief as possible, consistently with securing their 
own freedom. The ring-leader, a very large and strong mulatto, was 
named Madison Washington. He had previously run away from bondage, 
and staid in the family of Hiram Wilson, in Canada. But he grew home- 
sick for his wife, whom he left a'slave in Virginia; and he determined to 
rescue her at all hazards. He went back for this purpose, and was pro- 
bably caught by his master, and sokd to New Orleans as a punishment. At 
all events, he was next heard of, as the hero of the Creole. It is believed 
that his beloved wife was with him on board that vessel. The authorities 
of New Providence declared all the slaves free. Four or five of the 
women (supposed to be mistresses of the white men), were at first inclined 
to go back to the United States ; but when the case had been truly repre- 
sented to them by the colored people of the island, they took their freedom. 

" Daniel Webster, Secretary of State, officially demanded of Great 
Britain redress of these grievances, in a style which slaveholders applauded 

to the echo."— N. Y. A.S. Almanac, 1843. 

- 

*y This was under the Presidency of John Tyler. 

There was still another and a previous case, of a character 
too unique to admit of appropriate classification, but which 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 255 

may as well be related, in this place, as anywhere else. The 
readiness of the Federal Executive and. other officers of Gov- 
ernment to subserve the interests of slavery in general, is here 
strongly exhibited, though, for once, the Federal Judiciary 
was prevailed upon to interpose, and prevent the consumma- 
tion intended. 

THE CAPTIVES OF THE AMISTAD. 

" Nearly all these unfortunate Africans came from Mcndi, a country in 
the latitude of the Gallinas River, and probably from three to five hundred 
miles from the Atlantic coast. Their average age was about twenty. 
Some were as old as thirty ; and some as young as eight or nine. They 
were seized, and, with many others, hurried down to the coast about the 
last of April, 1839, and there, with three or four hundred men and boys, 
and about two hundred women and children, were put on board a slave ship 
for Havana. After the terrible " middle passage," placed between decks, 
where the space is less than three feet, they arrived at Havana. Here 
they were put into one of the large pens, or prison-houses, called Barra- 
coons, and offered for sale. In a few days Joseph Ruiz and Pedro Montes 
bought them. Ruiz bought forty-nine, and Montes bought the children, 
three little girls. They put them on board the schooner Amistad, a coaster, 
for Puerto Principe, Cuba, a few hundred miles from Havana. When they 
were two or three days out, they were beaten severely, threatened with 
death, &c. A quarrel took place. The cook and captain were killed, and 
two sailors fled in a boat. Cinquez, the master-spirit of the whole, as- 
sumed the command. He established a strict government over his com- 
rades, and compelled Ruiz and Montes to steer the schooner for the rising 
sun — their own native Africa. They did so by day, but in the night they 
deceived the Africans, and ran towards the United States. 

" In this way they arrived on the American coast, and came to anchor 
off Culloden Point, Long Island. Here some of them landed, made pur- 
chases (paying for all they took), and shipped water, intending to proceed 
on their passage, but they were taken possession of by Lieutenant Gedney, 
of the U.S. brig Washington, and carried into New London, Conn. Judge 
Judson bound them over to the Circuit Court for trial, on the charge of 
murder, &c. ; but Judge Thompson decided that our courts have no 
cognizance of offences committed on board Spanish vessels on the high 
seas. As, however, the vessel, cargo, and Africans had been libelled by 
Gedney and others for salvage, it was determined that a trial must take 
place in the District Court. It was held in January, 1810. Judge Judson 
decided that the prisoners were native Africans ; had never been slaves 
legally. He dismissed the libels with costs, and decreed that the Africans 



256 GKEAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

should be delivered to the President of the United States, to be sent back 
to Africa. But our government, on the demand of the Spanish minister, ap- 
pealed to the Circuit Court. This Court was held in April, 18-10. Judge 
Thompson sustained the appeal, and as one party or the other would appeal 
to a higher tribunal, whichever way he might decide, the case went up to 
the Supreme Court of the United States as a matter of form, for decision, 
in January, 1841. Thus, these free men were kept in an American jail 
eighteen months ! 

"Nine of the Africans died. They were instructed daily by benevolent 
persons. They made some progress in reading and speaking the English 
language ; and their conduct was very exemplary. James Covey, a native 
of Mendi, providentially brought to this country, acted as interpreter. 

" President Van Buren, at the request of the' Spanish minister, sent a 
U.S. ship to New Haven, to convey the Africans to Cuba, to be given up 
to the Spaniards, in case Judge Judson had not decided as he did." 

At the final trial before the Supreme Court of the United 
States, the Africans were released, and afterwards returned to 
Africa, in company with Missionaries, who went to reside 
among them. 

THE AFRICAN SLAVE TRADE. 

The Federal Government has neglected to take appropriate 
measures for suppressing the African slave trade, and has 
winked at the illegal introduction of slaves into this country. 
Though the trade has been interdicted on paper, it has been 
permitted to continue in practice. "While the slave breeding 
states have, from motives of interest, desired earnestly the 
non-importation of slaves from abroad, the slave consuming 
or planting states have, nevertheless, persisted in the illicit 
traffic, and the Federal Government, with a full knowledge 
of the fact, has, at times, winked at its continuance ; and the 
national policy, in regard to the subject, has been self-contra- 
dictory and unstable. In 1811 and in 181-1, under the Presi. 
dency of Mr. Madison, in 1817, in 1818, and 1819, under Mr. 
Monroe, official information of the introduction of foreign 
slaves was in possession of the Government, or the fact was 
successively noticed by official functionaries, as Collectors of 
Customs, the Secretary and officers of the navy, Judges of 
the Supreme Court, the Attorney General, and Members of 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 257 

Congress. Yet, in 1819, it was certified by Joseph Noursc. 
Register of the Treasury, that the Department contained do 
records of any forfeitures under the Act of 1807 abolishing 
the slave trade ! He had, however, heard of two recent for- 
feitures. It turned out that one of these cases was an acci- 
dental capture of a slaver, that a collusive or sham forfeiture 
of the bonds had been enacted, and that the owners, master, 
and supercargo, were discharged ! In 1820, a slave vessel, the 
Science, fitted out from New York, and commanded by A. 
Lacoste of Charleston, was captured on the coast of Africa, 
brought home, and Lacoste convicted before Judge Story, but 
pardoned by President Monroe ! — Jay's View, p. 94-108. 

The history of negotiations carried on between the Govern- 
ments of the United States and Great Britain in 1823 and 
1821, under Mr. Monroe, in connection with other facts, af- 
fords evidence of a persevering and settled duplicity, on the 
part of the American Government, in regard to the suppres- 
sion of the African Slave Trade. By the treaty of 1814, the 
two Governments had mutually promised to use their best en- 
deavors to abolish the "traffic in slaves.' 1 Mr. Canning, British 
Minister at Washington, in January, 1823, addressed a letter 
to the Secretary of State, J. Q. Adams, reminding him of 
this treaty, (which, by-the-by, he had assisted to negotiate,) 
and calling on the American Government to assent to the 
plan proposed by Great Britain,* or suggest another. The 
House of Representatives, soon after, requested the President 
to negotiate with the maritime powers of Europe and America,, 
"for the effectual abolition of the African slave trade, and its 
ultimate denunciation as piracy, under the laivs of nations by con- 
sent of the civilized world." The President adopted this as the 
basis of his proposal to Mr. Canning. Thus far all seemed 
sufficiently zealous and in earnest. But, mark the existing 
circumstances and the final result : At this time the British 
law had not made the slave trade piracy ; and, as it could not 

* The British Government, in 1819, had proposed to our Governmout e. mutual 
right of search to detect slavers, with slaves actually on board, and a positive- refusal 
to this proposal had been returned. 

17 



258 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

be done by treaty, the action of Parliament would be needed, 
and might long be delayed or withheld. The offer, therefore, 
was less hazardous. But the British Minister made no demur, 
and proceeded to propose a mutual right of search, under 
limitations and restrictions, to detect slavers. This teas the 
practical point. But this the American Government declined, 
though Britain, France, Spain, Portugal, Netherlands, Den- 
mark, Sweden, and Sardinia, have come into the measure. 

Yet the American Government renewed its proposition, by 
authorizing our Minister in England to conclude a treaty, on 
condition of a legislative prohibition of the slave trade as 
piracy. Great Britain took us at our word, and accepted 
the offer. The treaty was regularly drawn up and signed in 
London, March 13, 1824, and Parliament passed a corres- 
ponding Act, as our government had required. The Senate 
of the United States, however, delayed to ratify the treaty. 
The British Minister at Washington remonstrated. The 
President, as in honor bound, urged the ratification, suggest- 
ing, naturally enough, that the refusal would expose us to 
"the charge of inducer ity respecting the great result of the 
final suppression of the slave trade." The Senate, after long 
debates, ratified the treaty, in a mutilated form, adroitly 
striking out certain words, thus destroying its efficacy, giving 
full security to slavers while on the coast of "America" and 
also to the traffic carried on in "chartered" or hired vessels, 
&c. &c. ! 

The British Cabinet, of course, refused to agree to a sham 
treaty, but made several attempts to accommodate or com- 
promise the matter, which our Government promptly declined. 

Negotiations have since been renewed, but the final answer 
of the American Government (as we learn from the Edin- 
burgh Review for 1836,) was, "that under no condition, in no 
form, and with no restriction, will the United States enter into any 
convention, or treaty, or combined efforts of any sort or kind, ivith 
other nations for the suppression of this trade." — Jay's Vieiv, pp. 
109 to 118. Under whose administration this answer was 
given, is not stated ; but it was probably Gen. Jackson's. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 259 

A treaty similar to that formed in London, yet exempting 
the coast of America from its operation, had been concluded 
with the Republic of Colombia, in 182-4, but rejected by the 
United States Senate. — lb. p. 117. 

In November, 1825, the Colombian Minister at Washing- 
ton, while inviting the United States to send delegates to the 
proposed Congress of Panama, alluded to the suppression of 
the African slave trade, as an object deserving attention in 
that Congress. The document was submitted to the Senate, 
and a committee of that body made a Report, 16th January, 
1826, deprecating, in strong terms, any interference with the 
subject,— lb. 118-119. 

All this enables us to appreciate the pretense of desiring 
to make the African slave trade piracy ! Or, if the Cabinet 
and House of Representatives were honest in that measure, 
it betrays a different state of feeling in the Senate. 

The zeal shown by the Government for suppressing the 
African slave trade, and declaring it piracy, in 1817, 1819, 
1822, &c, has, however, a ready solution. It was urged on 
by the Virginia slave breeders, intent upon monopolizing the 
market of the planting states to themselves. u Piracy in Af- 
rica, and protection in America," would have been the appro- 
priate motto on their escutcheon ! A protective tariff, in favor 
of home products, of which the prohibitory tax was to be the 
halter ! A beautiful harmony among the successors of the 
"Patriarchs!" The rising sentiment of the civilized world 
against the slave trade, was surreptitiously subsidized to sub- 
serve the interests of the slave breeders for the southern 
market 1 

Very naturally did such a zeal against the African slave 
trade connect itself with the Virginian project of colonizing 
their free blacks in Africa! Quite conveniently were the 
measures for suppressing the African slave trade connected 
with measures, much more efficient, for assisting the Coloniza- 
tion Society, and the former made a cover and pretext for the 
latter, at the expense of the National Government, and with 
the semblance of philanthropy. But if the Act making the 



260 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

slave trade piracy, can be readily harmonized with the policy 
of Virginia, it is not as readily reconciled with the refusal of 
the Federal Government, the year previous, and ever after- 
wards, to co-operate with other nations in any efficient efforts 
for suppressing it. — See Jay's View, p. 103-109. 

It may be in place, here, to note down a few brief memo- 
randa of the Acts of the Federal Government, against the 
foreign slave trade.. 

By act of 1794, March 22, Congress prohibited, under for- 
feitures and fines, the building or equipping of any vessels in 
the United States, for carrying on the traffic in slaves to any 
foreign COUNTRY. — IngersolVs Abridgment, 670. Stroud,"!^. 

By act of May 10, 1800, it was made unlawful to be con- 
cerned or employed in the transportation of slaves from one 
foreign country to another, on pain of forfeitures, fines, and im- 
prisonment not exceeding two years. — lb. 672-3. Stroud, 
158-9. 

By act of February 28, 1803, Congress, in behalf of the 
Federal Government, co-operated with such of the States as 
had already prohibited the importation of slaves, assisting 
them in carrying into effect such laws. — Stroud, 159. 

By act of Congress, March 2, 1807, the importation of slaves 
from abroad was utterly prohibited after January 1, 1808.* 



* One provision of this act, prohibiting the transportation of slaves from one port 
to another, in certain vessels, excited the jealousy of John Randolph, of Roanoke, 
who, the day after its passage, thought he saw in it something hostile to the domestic 
slave trade, and brought forward a supplementary bill to avert the danger. 

"Sir," said he, " we may say what we please about alien and sedition laws, but 
this law, in my opinion, is the most frightful, the most abominable that was ever 
passed ! If this law went into operation, unless the owners of slaves were asleep, 
protests would be sent against it from every State south of the Potomac. As well 
might they pass a law prohibiting the transportation of slaves in wagons. He 
doubted whether they would ever see another Southern delegate on that floor. For 
one, he had no hesitation in saying — if the Constitution is to be violated, if the 
entering wedge is to be driven, let us secede and go Jiome." 

Old Mr. Smylie answered him : " The gentleman from Virginia says he will not 
trust Congress, and talks of the Southern States seceding from the Union. If they 
do not like the Union, let them say so. In the name of God, let them go ; we can 
do witTvout them." 

Thia answer somewhat cooled Mr. Raudolph. " lie complained that he had been 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 261 

Judge Stroud has elaborately and clearly pointed out the 
discrepancies of this act, according to which, " the negro, 
though illegally imported, yet, if so directed by the State Leg- 
islatures, he andliis offspring should be absolute slaves." "The 
Legislature of Louisiana was not tardy in improving the privi- 
leges thus preposterously conferred by Congress." By act of 
March 20, 1809, all slaves imported, in violation of the act of Con- 
gress of 1808, were directed " to be delivered into the hands of 
the treasurer of the territory, to be afterwards disposed of as the 
legislature should think proper!'' — Stroud, pp. 159 — 102. 1 Mar- 
tin's Digest, 664:. ".North Carolina and Georgia, respectively, 
adopted a similar law, the former in 1816. — Ilayward's Man- 
ual, 545 et. seq: the latter in 1817— Prince's Digest, 463." The 
act of Georgia, however, authorized the Governor to hand 
them over to the Colonization Society, on payment of ex- 
penses, &c. ! — Stroud, p. 162. 

By the act of April 20, 1818, more severe penalties were 
imposed upon the prosecution of the slave trade, but " re- 
enacting the odious sixth section of the act of 1807, and 
recognizing the laws of the several state legislatures on the 
subject, which have just been commented upon." — Stroud, p. 
163 ; IngersoWs Abridgment, 680. 

By act of March 2, 1819, the President was empowered to 
employ the Navy for the suppression of the traffic, also to 
provide for keeping and supporting the slaves re-captured, 
and remove them out of the United States, and finally repeal- 
ing the obnoxious provisions of the former acts which author- 
ized their enslavement by the state governments. 

By act of May 15, 1820, (a few weeks after the infamous 
Missouri compromise, and by the same Congress,) the African 
slave trade was made piratical! "But laws do not execute 



misrepresented. He had not threatened a dissolution of the Union. However, he 
said, if union and manumission of slaves are put in the scales, let union kick the 
beam.'''' 

This account is taken from the Providence Gazette, of July, 1820, now before us, 
in which (during the political contest in Rhode Island, growing out of the Missouri 
question) it was " copied from a newspaper priuted in the year 1807." 



262 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

themselves, and if any slave trader has suffered death in the 
United States, as a pirate, we confess our ignorance of the 
fact."— Jay's View, p. 108. 

Notwithstanding this repeal, the State 1 of Alabama, Jan. 1, 
1823, passed "an act to carry into effect the laws of the United 
States, prohibiting the slave trade," in which — with singular 
effrontery — " the laws of the United States " on the subject, 
were grossly violated, by authorizing the Governor to sell, for 
the benefit of the state, all persons of color who should be brought 
into the state contrary to the laws of the United States prohibiting 
the slave trade !! ! — See Toulmarfs Digest, 643; Stroud, 164. 

" The laws of the United States," in accordance with the 
Constitution, are " the supreme law of the land ; and the 
judges in every state shall be bound thereby, anything in the 
Constitution or laws of any state, to the contrary notwith- 
standing." — U. S. Constitution, Art. V. And yet we know of 
no action of the Federal authorities, or of the courts of Ala- 
bama, for setting aside this open and flagrant insult to a law 
of Congress by a state legislature. 

Thus it is that the Federal Government puts down the Af- 
rican slave trade by calling it "piracy" 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 263 



CHAPTER XXII. 

FURTHER ACTION OF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT. — CONTIN- 
UED SUBSERVIENCY OF THE NATIONAL DIPLOMACY TO THE 
DEMANDS OF THE SLAVEHOLDERS. 

Negotiations with Great Britain and Mexico for the surrendering of fugitive slaves — 
Compensation obtained of Great Britain for slaves captured— Negotiations with 
Spain and the South American Republics, to prevent emancipation in Cuba- 
Threat of preventing it by force of arms. 

We have already seen the*corps diplomatic employed at the 
national expense (both of money and honor) for the protec- 
tion of the American domestic slave trade, and in shameful 
evasion of the admitted obligation of assisting to suppress 
the African slave trade. But this is not the only vile service 
to which the diplomacy of the nation has been subjected by 
the slave power. 

The Federal Government has negotiated with Great Britain 
and with Mexico, for the surrendry of fugitive slaves, and 
has actually obtained compensation from Great Britain for 
slaves captured in war, or taking refuge on board their armed 
vessels. 

During the last British war, American slaves sometimes 
absconded, and took refuge on board the armed vessels of the 
enemy. Slaves were also captured, at times, and carried oft''. 
In negotiating the treaty of peace, this .matter was not for- 
gotten. Our Commissioners at Ghent, (Messrs. Clay, Bayard, 
Russell, Gallatin, and John Quincy Adams,) were carefully 
instructed by Mr. Monroe, then Secretary of State, under Mr. 
Madison, to "insist" upon the return of the slaves taken 



264 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

from the southern states, or full payment for their value. So 
adroitly did the Commissioners fulfil their trust that they not 
only obtained compensation for the slaves captured, but also, 
(as ultimately settled) for those who had absconded to the ves- 
sels of Britain. The application of the treaty to the case of 
the latter, was contested by the British Cabinet. The decision 
was referred to the Emperor of Russia, who, in 1818, decided 
in favor of the American claim, which, at length, in 1836, 
was liquidated, with interest, amounting to one million two 
hundred and four thousand dollars. — Jay's View, pp. 53-58. 

Thus, though the treaty of peace did not contain a sin- 
gle stipulation for securing either one of the objects for which 
America had ostensibly declared the war, (" free trade, sailors' 
rights," &c.,) yet it did contain ample and even exorbitant 
remuneration for fugitive slaves. On this issue, during the 
negotiation, was suspended the question of peace or con- 
tinued war ! 

Another negotiation with Great Britain, concerning fugi- 
tive slaves, took place under the administration of John 
Quincy Adams, Henry Clay being then Secretary of State, 
and had special reference to those who had taken refuge in 
Canada. The House of Representatives, May 10, 1828, 
requested the President to open a negotiation with the Brit- 
ish Government, for the surrendry of these fugitives. At 
the next session, the House called on the President to inform 
them of the result. "The President immediately submitted 
a mass of documents to the House, from which it appeared" 
(says Mr. Jay,) " that the zeal of the Executive in behalf 
of 'the peculiar institution' had anticipated the wishes of the 
Legislature. Two years before the interference of the House, 
viz : on the 19th of June, 1826, Mr. Clay, Secretary of State, 
had instructed Mr. Gallatin, American minister in London, 
to propose a stipulation for ' a mutual surrendry of all persons 
held to service or labor, under the laws of either party who 
escape into the territories of the other.' " Mr. Clay dwelt on 
the number of fugitive slaves in Canada, and suggested the 
benefits, to "West India planters, from such a stipulation. In 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 265 

February, 1827, the subject was again urged upon Mr. Galla- 
tin, informing him that a similar treaty had just been nego- 
tiated with Mexico. In July, the British minister declined 
the proposal. Mr. Barbour, the successor of Mr. Gallatin, 
was directed to renew the application. lie did so, but was 
answered promptly by the British minister, that the " law of 
Parliament gave freedom to every slave who effected his landing 
on British ground.''' — Jay's View, p. 47 — 50. The reader will 
readily trace this " law of Parliament " to the decision of 
Lord Mansfield in the Somerset case, and to the sagacity and 
perseverance of Granville Sharp. 

As to the treaty negotiated with Mexico, the Mexican 
Congress refused to ratify it. The refusal, as will appear in 
the sequel, was among the real grounds of our quarrel and 
war with Mexico, but it was not prudent to invade the do- 
minions of Great Britain. 

The Federal Government, by its diplomacy, has labored 
effectually to prevent the abolition of slavery in the neigh- 
boring Spanish Island of Cuba, lest such an occurrence should 
seriously affect the stability of slavery in our own Southern 
States. 

The immediate cause of alarm was the war raging between 
Spain and her American Colonies, and the prospect that the 
latter would throw off the dominion of the parent govern- 
ment, as the North American Colonies of Great Britain had 
done. The ordinary vicissitudes of war might emancipate 
the slaves of Cuba, but the danger was increased by the fact 
that the Spanish Colonies on this Continent had shown a dis- 
position to extend to all their inhabitants, irrespective of color 
or condition, the liberties for which they were contending. 
Some of them had already abolished slavery, and others of 
them were taking measures in that direction. If Cuba 
should share in the revolution, the Cuban slaves would doubt- 
less become free. 

Through the American Minister at Madrid, Mr. Everett, 
the Spanish Government was accordingly implored by the 
Cabinet at Washington to become reconciled to the colonies. 
Could this interference be traced to a love of peace, or an 



266 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

earnest desire for the independence of Spanish America, it 
might be regarded with admiration. But the instructions of 
our government to Mr. Everett, by the Secretary of State, 
Mr. Clay, forbid us thus to interpret the proceeding. " It is 
not for the new Republics," (said Mr. Clay to Mr. Everett,) "that 
the President wishes you to urge upon Spain the expediency 
of concluding the war." He proceeded to hint at the probable 
effects upon Porto Rico and Cuba, intimated that the " people 
of the United States could not be indifferent spectators," and 
that the possible contingencies of a protracted war might bring 
upon the Government of the United States duties and obligations 
the performance of which, however painful it should be, they might 
not be at liberty to decline." 

In other language, it would be the duty of the American 
Government to prevent those islands from becoming the the- 
atre of the war, even if the effort should involve the United 
States in a war to prevent it ! 

This letter was dated April 27, 1825. Of course it was 
under the Presidency of 'Mr. Adams, and among the earliest 
acts of his administration. The signincancy of the transaction 
is made, if possible, still plainer, by the tone soon after held 
by the administration towards our incipient sister republics, 
who, in the enthusiasm of their young love of liberty, had 
confidingly invited us to sit in council with them, at their pro- 
posed Congress of American Republics at Panama ; an invi- 
tation to which the public pulse in the United States — at least 
at the North — beat a hearty response. Messrs. Anderson and 
Sargeant were appointed our Ministers to that Congress. But 
in. his letter of instructions to them, May 8, 1826, our Secre- 
tary, Mr. Clay, gives them to understand the real object of 
their mission to that Congress of Freedom. It was rumored, 
and doubtless with good reason, that Colombia and Mexico 
meditated a descent upon Cuba, with a force that should con- 
fer upon its inhabitants a share in the blessings they were 
seeking. Such an enterprise, however, the Government of the 
United States would by no means permit. This message, their 
Ministers at Panama were required to convey to them. And 
it was given in language sufficiently explicit and peremptory. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 267 

' The United States," (they were to be told,) " have too much 
at stake in the fortunes of Cuba to allow them to see a ivar of inva- 
sion prosecuted in a desolating manner, and ONE RACE of the in- 
habitants combating against another.' 1 " The duty to defend 
themselves against the contagion of such a new and dangerous ex- 
ample, would constrain them, even at the hazard of losing the 
friendship of Mexico and Colombia, to employ all the means 
necessary to their security." 

That is, the United States would sooner go to war with 
Colombia and Mexico — would sooner join with despotic Spain 
in reducing them to their former condition — than to stand 
neutral and see the same liberation extended to Cuba ! 

Cold comfort this to the new republics in our neighborhood, 
just throwing off the yoke of European bondage ! This was 
the message conveyed them by the administration of Mr. 
Adams, at a time when the bulk of our northern citizens were 
exulting, in their simplicity, at the idea of holding a friendly 
and fraternal conference, at Panama, with our new republican 
neighbors. They knew, indeed, that certain southern mem- 
bers of Congress had blustered when the subject of the mis- 
sion was under debate in both Houses, had denounced the 
new republics as " buccaneers, drunk with their new-born lib- 
erty," because they had abolished slavery; even threatening 
to prevent the liberation of Porto Eico and Cuba, by force of 
arms. But they did not then know that the Federal Execu- 
tive and Cabinet were in sympathy with them. 

The threat had the desired effect upon Colombia and Mexi- 
co; the enterprise was abandoned, and Cuba remains enslaved! 

The fears of our Government were not, however, at once 
allayed. The war continued, and Cuba might yet become 
free. Mr. Van Buren, Secretary of State under President 
Jackson, on the 22d of October, 1829, instructed our Minister 
at Madrid, Mr. Yan Ness, to press on Spain a termination of 
the war. " Considerations," he remarked, " connected with a 
certain class of our population, make it the interest of the southern 
section of the Union that no attempt should be made in that 
island to tlirow off the yoke of Spanish dependence." — Jaifs 
View, p. 120-127. 



268 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 



CHAPTER XXIII. 

FURTHER ACTION OF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT — HAYTI — 
FLORIDA — THE SEMINOLE WAR. 

Non-intercourse with Hayti — Refusal to acknowledge its independence — Invasion of 
Florida, while a Spanish province, to break up a fortress of fugitive slaves — 
Threatened Conquest of Florida by the Georgians — Purchase of Florida — Florida 
Indians — Seizure of Osceola's wife, as a slave — Seminole War — Indians hunted 
with blood-hounds. 

We are burthened with the accumulated instances and 
modes in which our Federal Government has sustained slavery. 
We cannot proceed with the minute details. We will hastily 
advert to a few other topics. 

TREATMENT OF HAYTI. 

The American Government has manifested an inveterate 
and continual hostility to Hayti, for no reason but because 
Hayti is an independent nation of emancipated slaves. To 
the present hour we have neglected to recognize the inde- 
pendence of Hayti, and maintain no diplomatic relations with 
her, thousrh our commercial intercourse with the island has 
been more important than with several of the European na- 
tions, with whom, at a great expense, we maintain such rela- 
tions. By this neglect, numbers of our citizens having claims 
on the Haytien Government have been provided with no 
means of indemnity. The American Congress, in February, 
1806, during the administration of Mr. Jefferson, suspended 
commercial intercourse with Hayti, in servile obedience to the 
arrogant and peremptory demand of Napoleon, who was intent 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 269 

on reducing the inhabitants to submission, by starvation. At 
the Congress of Panama, before mentioned, our Ministers 
were instructed to decline any recognition of Hayti. — Jay's 
View, pp. 127-144. 

INVASION OF FLORIDA AND DESTRUCTION OF FUGITIVE SLAVES 
WHILE FLORIDA WAS A SPANISH PROVINCE. 

This demonstration was made under the administration of 
Mr. Madison, and in conformity with directions from Mr. 
Crawford, Secretary of War, addressed to General Jackson, 
March 15, 1816. General Jackson had, however, anticipated 
these directions. The object, openly avowed, was to break 
up a fort of between 250 and 300 blacks, who, it was said, 
enticed and protected negroes from the frontiers of Georgia. 
A gun-boat, by order of Commodore Patterson, fired upon the 
fort ; the magazine exploded, and nearly three hundred In- 
dians and negroes, men, women, and children, were killed or 
mortally wounded. — lb. p. 50-52. 

PURCHASE OF FLORIDA. 

But the trouble did not cease.. President Monroe was 
harassed with numerous letters from slaveholders in Georgia, 
declaring that their slaves were escaping continually into 
Florida, and finding an asylum there,* and if the Province 
was not secured by treaty, the Georgians would take it by 
force. These facts, according to Timothy Pitkin, f were stated 
in a secret session of the House of Eepresentatives, on the 
subject of the treaty, in 1819. The treaty of purchase (at 
die national expense, Jive millions of dollars) was concluded that 
same year. 



* Though slavery existed in Florida, it was of a much milder type than that of 
the United States. Free colored people enjoyed greater security, and the country 
afforded facilities for the secretion of fugitives, or their subsistence in retreats of 
difficult access, and among Indians. 

t Quarterly A. 8. Mag., Jan., 1836, p. 197. 



270 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 



THE SEMINOLE WAR. 

Florida was nevertheless destined to be the theatre of a 
pro-slavery war, prosecuted by the government of the United 
States. The Seminole Indians inhabited the marshy portions 
of that country. Fugitive slaves took refuge with them, and 
sometimes intermarried among them. Osceola, one of their 
chiefs, became the hero of a painfully interesting tragedy, 
illustrative of this condition of things. The following is from 
an account of him by M. M. Cohen : 

" Osceola, or Powell, as he was called by the whites, had a wife to whom 
he was much attached, whose mother was a mulatto, who ran away, was 
adopted by the Indians, and married one of their chiefs. Though the 
father was free, yet the children, by the law of the South, take the condi- 
tion of the mother. Osceola's wife was seized as a slave by a person 
claiming her under the right of her mother's former master ! The high 
spirited husband attempted to defend her, but was overpowered, and put in 
irons by Thompson, who commanded the party." " This transaction has 
been said to be the origin of the war in Florida." — Quar. A. S. Mag., 
Vol. II., p. 419. 

In this war Osceola was a conspicuous leader. He was 
perfidiously captured by the American Generals Herandez 
and Jessup, being surrounded by two hundred horsemen 
while " holding a talk," or negotiation, with his captors, in 
October, 1837. This was under the administration of Presi- 
dent Jackson. 

The cost to the United States of this long protracted slave 
hunt (for it was nothing else), has been estimated at forty 
millions of dollars. "What has the North to do -with 
slavery ?" 

In this war, the American flag was disgraced by the impor- 
tation of blood-hounds from Cuba, and the employment of 
them in hunting down the Indians, by advice and under 
the direction of General Zachary Taylor, whose services in 
the Seminole and Mexican wars — both for the benefit of 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 271 

slavery — were rewarded with the Presidency of the United 
Suites. It is quite remarkable that many who were loud in 
their condemnation of the administration of Gen. Jackson, 
on account of the use of the blood-hounds, were afterwards 
the zealous supporters of Gen. Taylor, the idol of the South. 
Thus do our parties bind us to slavery. 



272 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 



CHAPTER XXIV. 

FURTHER ACTION OF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT — ACQUISI- 
TION OF TEXAS. 

Slavery abolished in Mexico, including Texas — Emigration of American Slaveholders 
and Slaves to Texas — Attempted seizure of Texas by Americans in 1819 — Conspi- 
racy of settlers at Nacogdoches, in 1326— Scheme to purchase Texas, 1827 — Mex- 
ican refusal to sell — Texan Land Companies in the States — Armed emigration to 
revolutionize Texas — Meetings of sympathy in the States — No Executive action 
against it — Standard of revolt raised in Texas — Proclamation of Independence 
and re-establishment of slavery — Remonstrance of the Mexican Minister — Men- 
dacious reply of Mr. Forsyth — Gen. Gaines stationed near the frontier to counte- 
nance the revolters — Battle of San Jacinto — Defeat of Santa Anna — Acknowledg- 
ment by the American Government of Texan Independence — Proposed union 
with the States — Various obstacles and delays-Final admission of Texas, in 1845, 
and speedy hostilities with Mexico. 

Texas was a province of Mexico, and Mexico was a colony 
of Spain. In the general struggle of the Spanish American 
colonies to throw off the Spanish yoke, Mexico took a part, 
and asserting her independence, took measures in forming 
her constitution of government, in 1824, for the prospective 
but complete abolition of slavery. Having achieved her 
independence, she proceeded to cut short the tardy process 
of gradual extinction, by proclaiming the immediate and 
entire abolition of slavery, and the emancipation of all the 
slaves, September 15, 1829.* 

Texas was of course included, with the rest of Mexico, 
under these acts. But Texas was in process of settlement by 
emigrants from our American slave States, who had gone 

* Quarterly A. S. Mag., Jan., 1836, p. 195 ; Jay's Mexican War, p. 12. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 273 

thither with slaves, and with the view of extending their 
favorite "institution" into that new and fertile country. 
Lawless adventurers from the United States, under James 
Long, had attempted the forcible seizure of Texas for this 
purpose, as early as 1819,* while the country was a portion 
of Mexico, and under the jurisdiction of the Spanish Govern- 
ment, with which we were at peace ; but the enterprise had 
failed. When it was seen that the young Mexican Republic, 
by its Constitution of 1821, had provided for the gradual 
extinction of slavery, a body of American settlers, near 
Nacogdoches, under a leader of the name of Edwards, raised 
the standard of insurrection in 1826, declaring Texas inde- 
pendent, but were soon put down by the Mexican forces. 
" The united Provinces of Coahuila and Texas formed one 
State, and its Constitution, adopted in 1827, contained an 
article giving freedom to all who should be hereafter born, 
and prohibiting the introduction of slaves. "f 

Such was the position of things in Texas when the Mexi- 
can proclamation, of Sept. 15, 1829, emancipated every slave 
in the Mexican dominions. This produced the greatest dis- 
satisfaction among the American emigrants in Texas, and they 
determined to resist the execution of the law. For this pur- 
pose, one of them was deputed to the United States to procure 
arms and ammunition. In the distracted and feeble condition 
of Mexico, the new party then just coming into power felt it 
politic or necessary to relax the decree, so far as Texas was 
concerned, permitting a modified apprenticeship of the eman- 
cipated slaves, but providing that no indentures or contracts 
should be valid for more than ten years from their respective 
dates4 

This relaxation prevented an immediate rupture, but neither 
the Texan settlers, nor their friends in the United States, 
were satisfied, nor had they been before the emancipation 
decree had gone forth. The settlers wanted the unrestricted 



' 



* Jay's Mexican War, p. 12. t lb. 

X Quarterly A. S. Mag., Jan., 1S35, p. 193. 

18 



274 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

restoration and perpetuity of slavery. Our slave consuming 
States wanted an open field for slave emigration and security 
from a free border for fugitives. Our slave breeding States 
could brook no curtailment of their prospective privilege of 
a growing market. Texas must be made slave territory at 
all hazards. But the settlers were too weak to resist success- 
fully the Mexican government. Expeditions fitted out from 
the United States, at the expense of the slaveholders, in 1819 
and in 1826, had been found insufficient. What could be 
done? 

The plan was soon decided upon. Texas must be pur- 
chased of Mexico, at the expense of the United States. The 
Federal Government must do for the slaveholders, what they 
could not do for themselves. 

The prosecution of this plan was attempted under the 
administration of Mr. Adams, Mr. Clay being Secretary of 
State, by whom, in March, 1827, Mr. Poinsett, our Minister 
in Mexico, was instructed to offer one million of dollars for 
the purchase. Under President Jackson, in 1829, the bid was 
raised to five millions, and when the offer was declined, Mr. 
Poinsett offered the Mexican government A loan of ten 
millions, proposing to take Texas in pawn until repaid, 
intending, of course, to get possession, stock it with slaves, 
and keep it at all events ! This offer was justly considered an 
insult. This same year, Thomas H. Benton, Judge Upshur, 
Mr. Gholson, and other prominent Southern statesmen as well 
as editors, openly urged the necessity of acquiring Texas as 
a means of extending slavery and improving the slave market. 

The negotiation was relinquished as a failure. The Mexi 
cans refused to dismember their republic by selling Texas. 
This, too, after having also refused, in 1827, as before noticed, 
to stipulate for the surrendry of fugitive slaves. From this 
time it was resolved to get Texas by force. If the vineyard of 
Naboth could not be purchased from him for money, he could 
be killed, and the field taken for nothing.* 

* 1 Kings, chap. xxi. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 275 

Now came the era of Texan land companies — armaments — 
invasions — insurrections. Extensive tracts of land, said to 
have been obtained by grants from the Mexican government, 
came into our American market, and were speculated upon 
by capitalists, gamblers, politicians, and demagogues. These 
purchases secured only a title to the soil, under Mexican juris- 
diction. But that which the purchasers were after was slave 
plantations, and this end could not be obtained without wrest- 
ing Texas, from the jurisdiction of Mexico. Not a little of 
this capital was invested by citizens' of the non-slaveholding 
states. Three of the principal Texan land companies were 
established in the City of New York, the scrip being of little 
value while Texas remained under the anti-slavery laws of Mex- 
ico, but was expected to rise rapidly whenever Texas became in- 
dependent. Eecruits of volunteers from the United States were 
at length openly enlisted for this enterprise, and proceeded to 
Texas, under popular military commanders, who publicly an- 
nounced their intentions, and advertised in the public prints 
for the number of men they respectively wished to employ. 
Armed emigration was now all the rage. Public meetings of 
the "Friends of Texas" were advertised and held, at which 
speeches were made in favor of assisting the Texans, military 
companies of emigrants were paraded, and the enthusiasm 
raised to a high pitch. In Mississippi, in Florida, in North 
Carolina, in various parts of the Slave States, and even in 
Cincinnati, Ohio, were these scenes witnessed, and arms and 
ammunition openly purchased to aid in these expeditions. 
On their starting from their places of rendezvous, the Gazettes 
and Journals of the day exultingly heralded their departure. 

All this was in flagrant and gross violation of our peaceful 
relations with Mexico, in violation of the laws of nations, and 
the laws of the land, which forbid any expeditions against 
nations with whom we are at peace. Aaron Burr had been 
arrested and tried for the crime of attempting a similar in- 
vasion of Mexico, in 1807. Presidents Washington, in 1793, 
Jefferson in 1806, Madison in 1815, and Van Buren in 1S38, 
had issued proclamations forbidding our citizens to invade the 



276 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

provinces of other nations, or intermeddle with their internal 
dissensions. But no such proclamation was issued by Presi- 
dent Jackson on this occasion, though no emergency more 
loudly demanding the measure had ever before occurred. 

Under these circumstances it was, and by these means, that 
the standard of revolt was raised in Texas, by the American 
settlers, against the government of Mexico, which was, at that 
time, weakened by dissensions at home. The colonists, in 
1833, organized themselves into a distinct and separate state, 
preparatory to independence, because the people of Coahuila, 
with whom they were associated, were not favorable to the 
measure. Mexico refused to recognize this new organization. 
The standard of open' rebellion in Texas was then raised, the 
small body of Mexican troops were driven out, and " on the 
2d of March, 1836, the insurgents issued their declaration of 
independence, and fifteen days afterwards adopted a constitu- 
tion establishing perpetual slavery." " Of the fifty-seven 
signers to this declaration" of independence, fifty were emi- 
grants from the slave states, and only three Mexicans by birth, 
and these, it is said, were largely interested in Texan land 
speculations.* 

"Nothing," says Mr. Van Buren, "is more true or more 
extensively known than that Texas was wrested from Mexico, 
and her independence established through the instrumentality 
of citizens of the United States."f Mr. Clay, while the ques- 
tion of the annexation of Texas was pending, alluded to the 
same fact as a reason why our government should not be 
precipitate in that measure, in advance of the recognition by 
Mexico herself, lest the civilized world should upbraid our 
rapacity. X 

The Mexican Minister at Washington, in the meantime, had 
remonstrated against these proceedings. In October, 1835, he 
informed the Secretary of State that large numbers of vessels 
were about to sail from New York with military stores for the 



* Jay's Mexican War, p. 22. t lb. 

\ We Btate the substance from memory, the speech not being at hand. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 277 

insurgents, and that an armed schooner had sailed for Texas 
from New Orleans, without papers from the Mexican consul. 
Our Secretary, Mr. Forsyth, thereupon addressed circulars to 
the several District Attorneys, directing them, in general terms, 
to prosecute violations of treaties with foreign nations, but no 
efficient measures were taken, and no offenders were punished. 
A District Attorney in Ohio, soon after, made an address at a 
Texan meeting, in favor of assisting the Texans ! To a second 
remonstrance of the Mexican Minister, Mr. Forsyth very coolly 
and mendaciously replied that the Government, hud done all 
in its power to prevent interference ! 

A few days before this assurance, General Gaines was di- 
rected by the President to take a position near the frontier, 
ostensibly to prevent the contending parties from entering our 
territory, of which there was no danger. He was not directed 
to prevent regiments raised in the United States from invading 
Texas ! Under pretense of defending our frontiers, he next 
marched his troops into Texas, against the remonstrances of 
the Mexican Minister, with the evident object of affording 
countenance to the insurgents, and, if necessary, assist them 
against the Mexican forces, under pretense of defending our 
frontier. Some hundreds of his soldiers, deserted and joined 
the Texans. There they remained and served while they were 
lauded. General Gaines then offered them a full pardon on 
condition of their return. 

Thus encouraged and aided, the Texans, or rather the 
American armed emigrants, fought the decisive battle of San 
Jacinto, and defeated Santa Anna, in May, 1836. The* intelli- 
gence was transmitted to our American President, Jackson, by 
the American General, Gaines, who indulged the anticipation 
that, in consequence of the victory, " this magnificent ac- 
quisition to our Union " would grace his administration. — 
Jag's Mexican War, p. 30. 

And all this is said to have been done without violating 
.our relations of peace with Mexico! 

On the opening of Congress in December, 1836, President 
Jackson recommended a prudent delay in acknowledging the 



278 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN" 

independence of Texas, till " the lapse of time or the course of 
events " should have proved her ability to maintain her posi- 
tion. This proved to have been a ruse to allay the fears of 
the friends of freedom. Not long after, the President urged 
Congress to put at his disposal a naval force to act against 
Mexico in case she failed to make prompt arrangements for 
satisfying our pecuniary claims against her. With such a 
force he could easily get into a war with Mexico, and then 
" the course of events " would soon lead to the acknowledgment 
of Texan independence. " This proposition was coldly re- 
ceived." " The session was to close the third of March, 1837." 
By the most dexterous management of the House of Repre- 
sentatives, and the concurrence of the Senate, near the close 
of the session, the independence of Texas was acknowledged, 
and a salary provided a Minister to the new nation I A Min- 
ister was immediately nominated by the President, and con- 
firmed by the Senate, the last day of that administration. — 
Jay's View, p. 153. 

Nothing was now wanting to complete the drama of Texas, 
but her admission into the Union. The strong opposition, 
at the North, against this measure, delayed it for about eight 
years, and until near the close of Mr. Tyler's administration, 
in March, 1845. 

The Texan Congress took measures, as early as 1836, (be- 
fore our government had acknowledged their independence,) 
for proposing a union with the United States, but on the ex- 
press condition of the " free and unmolested authority 
OVER their slave population." In 1837 the negotiation was 
opened by the Texan Minister at "Washington. Mr. Van 
Buren prudently declined on the ground that the United 
States were, at present, at peace with Mexico, and that power 
had not acknowledged the independence of Texas. As the 
excitement against annexation increased in the free States, the 
proposition of Texas was formally withdrawn, and the appre- 
hension of annexation was, by this movement, allayed. 

In the mean time, the emigration to Texas from the free 
States began to alarm the guardians of slavery. In 18-12 the 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 279 

ex-President of Texas, General Lamar, addressed a letter to 
his friends in Georgia, urging the necessity of annexation, lest 
the anti-slavery party in Texas should change the Constitution, 
and abolish slavery. He added that though the anti-slavery 
party were now a minority, yet the majority of the people of 
Texas were not slaveholders. The clamor of the South for 
annexation was now revived. A false alarm, without the 
least shadow of foundation, was got up, that England intended 
in some way, to interfere in the affairs of Texas, and insist on 
the abolition of slavery. The British Government disclaimed 
any such intention.* Yet President Tyler negotiated with 
Texas a treaty of annexation, in the face of earnest remon- 
strances from the Mexican Minister at Washington, and the 
instrument was signed by the Secretary of State, Mr. Calhoun. 
The Senate of the United States, however, refused its ratifica- 
tion of the treaty. This was in April, 1811, and it was not 
until March 1st, 1815, just before the close of Mr. Tyler's ad- 
ministration, that the measure was carried by joint resolution 
of both Houses of Congress, after a severe struggle, and in di- 
rect violation of the Federal Constitution, which invests the 
treaty-making power in the President and Senate. Texas 
assented July 4th, and was formally received the 22d of De- 
cember. 

Hostilities with Mexico soon followed ; but we must, in a 
way of digression, go back and give some account of an at- 
tempt of the slaveholders upon that country, about forty years 
previous. 

* Mr. Calhoun, while Secretary of State, in April, 1344, officially declared, in a 
letter to the American Agent at Mexico, that the annexation of Texas had been 
" forced on the Government of the United States in self-defense, in consequence of 
the policy adopted by Great Britain in reference to the abolition of slavery in 2'exas." 

The accusation was false — the confession was true. Slavery was at the bottom of 
the matter. Eight years before this (May 27, 1836), long before there was any pre- 
tense of British interference, Mr. Calhoun had said in the Senate, " There are power- 
ful reasons why Texas should be a part of this Union. The Southern States, owning 
a slave population, were deeply interested in preventing that country from having 
the power to annoy them." On the 19th of February, 1347, General Houston, 
under whose directions the treaty between Texas and Mexico had been negotiated, 
declared, in the Senate, "England never proposed the subject of slavery or of abo- 
lition, to Texas." 



280 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 



CHAPTER XXV. 

CONSPIRACY FOR THE CONQUEST OF MEXICO AND THE DISRUP- 
TURE OF THE FEDERAL UNION IN 1806 — CONTROLLING POW- 
ER OF THE CONSPIRATORS OVER THE FEDERAL JUDICIARY. 

Arrest of Colonel Aaron Burr, 1807— His previous history— Detection of the plot by 
Gen. Win. Eaton — Sketch of his history — Object of the conspiracy — A South- 
western Empire, including slaveholding Mexico and the American slave States — 
Extent and power of the conspiracy— Prominent men — Trial of Burr— Sympathy 
of the South — Arts successfully employed for his acquittal. 

^Ve shall venture to fix here an earlier date than is com- 
monly given, to the machinations and attempts of prominent 
citizens, statesmen, capitalists, and military men, chiefly, 
(though not exclusively,) of the South and Southwest, for the 
conquest or dismemberment of Mexico, and with a special 
view to the security and expansion of the slave system. The 
time, we think, has now fully come, when, upon a full review 
of the past, connecting nearer and more familiar events with 
those more remote and obscure, and reading the more distant 
in the light of the more recent, we may better understand the 
secret springs of certain movements which caused no little ex- 
citement and surprise, in their day, presenting a riddle which 
few Northern statesmen then on the stage appeared fully to 
comprehend. 

The arrest and trial of Col. Aaron Burr, under Mr. Jeffer- 
son's administration, in 1807, fills a brief paragraph or two 
in our popular histories. But a well-digested manual and 
review of the facts that came out on the trial, and that occu- 
pied the political journals of that day, could they now be col- 
lected and published, would make a thrilling and highly 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 281 

instructive volume. The details were altogether astound- 
ing. 

Colonel Burr, as a politician, as a statesman, and as a mili- 
tary man, held rank among the first men of the country. As 
a competitor with Mr. Jefferson for the Presidency, he received 
from the people precisely the same number of electoral votes. 
In the House of Representatives, in 1801, it required thirty- 
five ballotings to decide between the two, when a change of 
one vote resulted in the election of Mr. Jefferson ; but, as the 
Constitution then stood, Colonel Burr was, of course, invested 
with the Vice-Presidency for four years.* 

The sudden arrest of so prominent a statesman for high 
treason, and in a time of general quiet, was like a clap of 
thunder out of a clear sky. It produced a sensation the most 
profound and extensive. Except for his slaughter of Gen. 
Alexander Hamilton, in a duel, in July, 1801, Col. Burr, 
though of loose private morals, had stood before the country 
in general, unsuspected of crime. The occasion of the duel 
was this : Col. Burr, having been supplanted in the affec- 
tions of the democratic party by his only rival, Mr. Jeffer- 
son, became cool in his party attachments, and was appa- 
rently in the attitude of changing sides. At this crisis, a 
portion of the Federal party in the State of New York pro 
posed him as their candidate for Governor. Gen. Hamilton, 
as a leading member of that party, strongly opposed the 
nomination, denouncing Col. Burr as an unprincipled aspirant 
and " dangerous to the country." Col. Burr sent him a chal- 
lenge, which Gen. Hamilton accepted, and fell. His strong 
declaration concerning Col. Burr excited wonder at that time, 
but it was afterwards conjectured that he entertained secret 
suspicions, or had received intimations, of his treasonable 
designs. It appeared at the trial, and afterwards, that Burr 
had made secret overtures to several prominent men who had 



* Wil'Uon's American History, p. 443. The votes were given only for a President, 
and after electing the President, the candidate having the next greatest number of 
votes was Vice-President. 



282 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

declined co-operation with him, but who had considered them- 
selves bound by Masonic obligations or otherwise to observe 
silence. He had carried on a very extensive correspondence 
in "the Cypher of the Eoyal Arch Masons," and it was be- 
lieved, during and after the trial, that his connection with 
that fraternity did much to shield and acquit him. 

Be this as it may, to Gen. "William Eaton, of Massachu- 
setts, was reserved the honor of detecting the dangerous 
conspirac}r, and lodging information with the Government. 
Gen. Eaton had been American Consul at Tunis, during our 
war with the piratical Barbary powers, and had concerted 
with Hamet, the legitimate but exiled sovereign of Tripoli, 
an expedition against the usurper who had dethroned him, 
and with whom this country was at war. Communicating 
this project to his Governnent, and obtaining due authority 
from it, he had embarked in the perilous expedition with a 
few followers of Hamet and some Egyptian troops. He had 
marched, with incredible fatigue and suffering, over a desert 
of a thousand miles in extent, had taken Derne, a Tripolitan 
city, by assault, had fought two battles with the reigning 
Bashaw, and had obtained terms of peace which had been 
accepted by our agent, Mr. Lear, thus suddenly and success- 
fully closing our long and expensive naval war of five years 
in the Mediterranean.* He returned to America, the military 
idol of his times. The whole northern country was resound- 
ing with his exploits against the barbarians who had captured 
and enslaved so many American citizens! But Gen. Eaton was 
a New Englander and a Federalist. The South could never 
permit such an one to wear military laurels. Worse than 
all this — Gen. Eaton, while residing at Tunis, had written 
letters home to his wife, which had, somehow, appeared in 
print, in which he described the horrors of Tunisian sla- 
very, but had declared, that he blushed at the remembrance 
of having witnessed worse scenes in his own country !f This 



* Willsori's simerican History, pp. 444-5. 
t Liberty Bell, p. 33. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 283 

sealed the fate of Gen. Eaton. Not only was he coldly re- 
ceived at the seat of Government, but the most mean and 
frivolous cavils were raised and charges preferred against him. 
His accounts of necessary expenditures were disputed and 
disallowed, reducing him to bankruptcy, and attempts were 
made to cashier and disgrace him. Triumphantly vindicating 
himself, at every point, but literally plundered by his Gov- 
ernment, he retired, in deep disgust, from its service, carrying 
with him the sympathies of his New England fellow-citizens, 
who found in his wrongs, fresh aliment for their hatred of 
Mr. Jefferson and his administration. 

Then it was that Col. Burr conceived the idea of adding 
Gen. Eaton to the long list of his military adventurers, and 
approached him accordingly. But he mistook his man. The 
General listened silently till he had unfolded the whole 
scheme. A new Southern and Western Empire ivas to be estab- 
lished, with New Orleans for its capital, and extending, if p>ossible, 
over Mexico. The extreme Southern with the South Western 
States were confidently calculated upon to oppose no serious 
obstacle to the measure, and in fact, to come into it ; quite 
greedily. As many of the southern states as possible were 
to be drawn into it. To the question, what disposition was 
to be made of the existing Federal Government, the ready 
answer was, " They can probably be managed easily enough, 
but if not, we will assassinate the President, and turn Con- 
gress, neck and heels, into the Potomac." General Eaton de- 
clined the overture, and, nobly forgetting his own personal 
grievances, lost no time in communicating the particulars to 
the Government that had wronged him. Col. Burr and several 
others were arrested. Col. Burr was charged, first, with high 
treason; second, with a high misdemeanor, in attempting an 
invasion of Mexico, a province of Spain. The single testimony 
of Gen. Eaton was thought sufficient to have convicted him, 
but it was only a tithe of what could be brought forward. 
So extensive and so powerful was the conspiracy found to be, 
and so wide-spread appeared to be the sympathy of the South 
with the prisoners, that it was feared, at one time during the 



284 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

trial, that, whether the arraigned were condemned or acquit- 
ted, the enterprise would in some way be resumed. It was 
currently understood that prominent men at the South, who 
were as deeply implicated as Col. Burr, and who were, in fact, 
the originators of the plot, were not arrested because it was 
not deemed prudent to proceed further. Among other rumors, 
one was, that Col. Burr was about to turn States' evidence 
against some of them, to procure indemnity for himself. But 
the matter appears to have been compounded more easily.* 
Quite evident it was that the northern states were mainly 
depended upon to sustain the Government, at that crisis, 
though nearly all the political opposition to the administration 
was northern. Except Col. Burr, few northern citizens, we 
believe, were implicated, or even suspected of being in the 
conspiracy: Whoever succeeds in ferreting out the names of 
the prominent southern men implicated or falling under strong 
suspicion at that period, need not be surprised to meet with 



* The arts employed to shield the accused from conviction, are quite apparent 
even upon a cursory glance at the records of the trial. The indictment was so 
drawn up as to charge him only with treasonable acts or misdemeanors committed 
by him on Blennerhassett's Island, in the river Ohio, the residence of one of his 
accomplices, while the great mass of the evidence in the hands of the prosecuting 
attorney had respect to acts committed elsewhere! By this barefaced fraud, "al- 
most all the important testimony was excluded by the court from coming before the 
Jury.' 1 '' The testimony of Blennerhasset was rejected likewise. So well was this 
stratagem understood by the Jury, that after retiring, for a short time, they returned 
with the following written verdict, read by Col. Carrington, their foreman : 

" We, of the Jury, say that Aaron Burr is not proved guilty under this indictment, 
by any evidence submitted to us. We, therefore, find him not guilty." 

Exceptions were taken to this verdict, that it was unusual, and that it seemed to 
"censure the Court for suppressing irrelevant testimony.''' 1 The Jurors, however, 
"would not agree to alter it" "The Court then decided that the verdict should 
remain as fovmd by the Jury,_and that an entry should be made on the record of 
Not guilty.'''' — Burr's Trial, reported by David Robertson, Esq., Counsellor-at- 
Law. Philadelphia: Hopkins and Earle, 1808. Vol. II., pp. 446-7. 

The writer well remembers the prevailing public impression at the North. The 
feeble efforts of the prosecution, the evident bias of the Court, and the apparent 
apathy of the Executive, suggested the suspicion that the matter was better under- 
stood at the South than at the North, and that the Administration had either 
favored the project, and did not wish, or did not dare, to press the prosecutions 
with vigor. Partisan feelings may have entered into these suspicious, but they were 
extensively entertained. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 285 

several names that have appeared among the advocates of 
forcible pro-slavery extension, since. The writer will not trust 
his youthful reminiscences further than to say, that the name 
of Andrew Jackson, in 1807, was pretty familiarly coupled, in 
the public prints, with that of Aaron Burr, and that the cir- 
cumstance was again freely alluded to by the political opponents 
of Gen. Jackson, who were supporters of William II. Oravford, 
at the South, during the Presidential canvass of 182-i. It was 
a Georgia Editor, if we remember correctly, who spoke of it 
as though it were a fact well understood, that Jackson was an 
accomplice of Burr. 

The acquittal of Col. Burr astonished the people of the 
North, little less than did his arrest. The secret was not un- 
derstood. So overwhelming was the public condemnation of 
Burr, notwithstanding his judicial acquittal, that, with all his 
easy and graceful assurance, he could never again lift up his 
head in American society. He soon left the country, and 
was, for years, a voluntary exile, in different countries of Eu- 
rope. He seems to have hoped, at first, that the verdict of 
his acquittal would have been his passport abroad. But it was 
not so. The facts elicited at the trial had preceded or soon 
followed him. With a polish and fascination of manners that 
would have graced any royal court, with talents that would 
have rendered him an acquisition to any European cabinet, 
with an energy of action that might have made him the ad>- 
miration of a Napoleon, he sought employment in vain. He 
sued for a military post under the French Emperor, but was 
repulsed. Obscurity, thenceforward, was the doom of Aaron 
Burr. He returned to the city of New York, and earned his 
bread, till his death, at an advanced age, by the labors of a 
counsellor-at-law and a draftsman of legal instruments, with- 
out ever again appearing as a barrister in a court of justice. 
He was a disgraced man. If the Federal Judiciary could save 
his neck, it could not save his good name. A free people had 
assumed to act as a jury in the case, and the decision could 
not be reversed. 

That the Federal Courts could not convict a traitor, whose 



266 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

treason consisted in fealty to the Genius of slavery extension, is 
a phenomenon not very difficult of explanation, now. Nor 
need the secret spring of the Burr conspiracy fee a problem 
of wearisome conjecture. At a time when the expected pro- 
hibition of the Foreign Slave trade was approaching, the 
natural instincts of the southern country, as since exhibited, 
must have impelled, with almost resistless energy, the appe- 
tency for western expansion. The purchase of Louisiana, 
about the same period, was only another symptom of the 
same insatiable thirst. Whether the acquisition of Louisiana 
were cause or effect of the great Southern Conspiracy that 
exploded in 1807, or which of them, in reality, was in progress 
first, or whether the purchase was not designed to satisfy the 
conspirators, it might be difficult, at this distance of time, to 
determine. That there was a close affinity between them, no 
one can deny. The taste of Louisiana would as naturally 
whet the appetite for Mexico, then, as did the taste of Texas 
the appetite for California, more recently. 

Not more truly characteristic was the acquittal of Burr, 
than the significant silence observed respecting the conspiracy 
ever since. The suspected treason of the Hartford Convention 
has swollen into volumes. The taint of affinity with it is 
fatal. The orator's tongue never tires in execrations of it. 
But the great Southern conspiracy (for such it was, though 
with a Northern accomplice) is seldom mentioned, and history 
almost passes it over in silence. High time were it to restore 
that long suppressed chapter, and let posterity know that 
but for the fidelity of Gen. William Eaton, of Massachu- 
setts, "our glorious Union " would probably have been 
shivered to atoms by the slaveholders, in the year 1807, with- 
out even a show of resistance at the South. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 287 



CHAPTER XXVI. 

FURTHER ACTION OF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT — THE WAR 
WITH MEXICO — ACQUISITION OF CALIFORNIA, NEW MEXICO, 
AND UTAH. 

The project of Mexican Conquest never relinquished since 1S07 — Suspension of 
effort till 1819 — War of 1846 — Its causes— Federal Government bent on a Con- 
quest or Dismemberment of Mexico — Testimony on this point — Review of relations 
with Mexico since 1836 — Unreasonable and fraudulent claims of our Government 
— Insolent demands — Territory wanted, not money — Naval armament — Com. 
Jones — His Annexation of California by proclamation, in 18-11 — Its failure — 
Attempts to intimidate Mexico, and to provoke a War — Demand that she should 
acknowledge the Independence of Texas — Negotiations for territory — Their failure 
— War determined on, and commenced — False claim of boundary of Texas — Gen. 
Taylor ordered to occupy Mexican territory — Manoeuvres to provoke hostilities — 
Their failure — The first blow struck by Gen. Taylor — False announcement to Con- 
gress by the President — Corresponding declaration by Congress, May 11, 1346 — 
Prosecution of the War — Adventure of Col. Fremont — Testimony that it was a 
War of Conquest — Barbarities and depredations — Subserviency of Congress — 
President's request for money to purchase Territory — Wilmot Proviso twice passed 
in the House — Defeated in the Senate — Then lost in the House — Negotiations with 
Mexico for Territory — Offered on condition of excluding Slavery — Offer rejected — 
Final adjustment — Cost. of acquired Territory. 

THE LATE WAR WITH MEXICO. 

The detection and exposure of the great Southern con- 
spiracy against the Federal Union and against Mexico, though 
it interposed a temporary check on the enterprise, removed 
neither the cause nor the disposition that had engendered it. 
There is not the slightest reason to suppose that the purpose 
of invading and conquering Mexico was ever for one moment 
relinquished. From the trial and acquittal of Aaron Burr, 
in 1807, to the actual- beginning of military excursions into 
Texas, then a province of Mexico, in 1819, as already related, 
there was an interval of only twelve years, less time than could 



288 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

have been supposed needful to allay public apprehension, to 
divert attention to other topics, to draw the veil of oblivion 
over the past, to transfer the odium of incipient treason from 
the South to the North, to place the Slave Power on a high 
ground above Free Labor, to organize the conspiracy anew, 
and to subsidize the Federal Government itself for the accom- 
plishment of its objects, instead of attempting again its direct 
overthrow. 

How effectively those twelve years were thus occupied, the 
history of the country will show. A glimpse of it we may 
take before long ; but will first follow out the Mexican drama 
to its close. 

The annexation of Texas, while she was at war with Mex- 
ico, was equivalent to a declaration of war against the-latter. 
But Mexico was not in a position to wage war against us ; and 
had the Slave Power, that controls the Federal Government 
at its pleasure, been satisfied with the acquisition of Texas, 
our amicable relations with Mexico, if not undisturbed, might 
have been easily restored. Indeed, there were no actual hos- 
tilities between the two republics until the invasion of Mexico, 
in the summer of 1845, by the American forces, by direction 
of President Polk, and without authority from Congress. 

In his " Review of the Mexican War" Mr. Jay has clearly 
and conclusively shown that the Federal Government, not 
content to wink at and even encourage and aid the lawless 
invasion arid revolution of Texas, to acknowledge its inde- 
pendence, and to annex it to this country, was resolutely bent 
upon a still farther dismemberment of Mexico, either by pur- 
chase or conquest. 

So early as April, 1842, Mr. Wise, of Virginia, in a speech 
in Congress, openly avowed the policy of conquest, and pre- 
dicted its accomplishment, for the purpose of extending 
slavery. He boasted that it was the people of our own West- 
ern Valley that had conquered Santa Anna at San Jacinto. He 
gloried in the prospect that they would join the Texans and 
proclaim a crusade against the rich States of the South, " cap- 
ture towns, rifle churches," and "plant the lone star of the 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 289 

Texan banner on the Mexican capital." " Let the work once 
begin" (said Mr. Wise), " and I do not know as this house 
would hold me very long. Give me five millions of dollars, 
and I would undertake to do it myself" — "i would place 
California where all the powers of Great Britain would never 
be able to reach it. Slavery should pour itself abroad, 

AND FIND NO LIMIT BUT THE SOUTHERN OCEAN." " War 

is a curse, but it has its blessings too. I would vote for this 
mission" [of Waddy Thompson to Mexico], "as a means of 
preserving peace, but if it must lead to war, I would vote for 
it more willingly." 

This was under the administration of President Tyler, of 
whose policy Mr. Wise was the recognized leader in the House 
of Representatives. The real object of Mr. Thompson's mis- 
sion, as disclosed by his course and the results, fully justified 
the foreshadowings of this speech. Mr. Tyler showed his 
affinity with Mr. Wise, by appointing him Minister to France. 
But the effort to get into a war with Mexico was of a still 
earlier date than this. 

OUR CLAIMS UPON MEXICO. 

The only ostensible cause of complaint against Mexico, was 
the claims of certain American citizens for depredations com- 
mitted on their property by Mexicans, or by subordinate 
officials of the Mexican government. Mr. Jay has thoroughly 
sifted these claims, and shown that they constituted no just 
ground or necessity of war. 

The first claim, in July, 1836, under President Jackson, 
consisted of fifteen distinct specifications of alleged facts, 
requiring time for their proper investigation. Of the exist- 
ence of many of them, the Mexican Government may well be 
supposed to have been wholly ignorant, as they claimed to 
have been, until the complaint was presented. Yet the Amer- 
ican Minister, Mr. Ellis, was directed to obtain a satisfactory 
answer within three iveeks, or announce that, unless satisfac- 
tion was made without unnecessary delay, his further resi- 
dence would be useless. If this threat proved unavailing, he 

19 



290 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

was to give notice that, unless he received a satisfactory answer 
in two tveeks, he should demand his passports and return 
home. Mr. Ellis was a Mississippi slaveholder, eager to 
extend the area of slavery by a dismemberment of Mexico. 
Another remarkable feature of this demand was, that Mr. 
Ellis was informed by our government that it was not in pos- 
session of "the 'proof of all the circumstances of the wrong 
done in the above cases !" The reparation was to be demanded 
first, under a threat of war, and the justice of the claim 
ascertained afterwards ! Mr. Ellis was to be sole judge whe- 
ther there was "unnecessary delay, " and whether the answers 
were "satisfactory." The alleged aggressions were mostly of 
recent date. Similar claims on France and England had been 
matter of negotiation for ten or twenty years, without a threat 
of war, but Mexico was required to finish up the whole busi- 
ness in five weeks ! Before Mr. Secretary Forsyth's dispatches 
reached Mr. Ellis, two out of the fifteen wrongs had been set- 
tled to the satisfaction of the parties, and many of the remain- 
der were proper subjects of investigation in the Mexican 
courts, to which, by treaty, our citizens had access, as their 
citizens had to ours. Of this the Mexican Secretary reminded 
Mr. Ellis, but promptly proceeded, nevertheless, to an investi- 
gation of the claims. Mr. Ellis thought proper to add five 
more complaints, without waiting for any directions from his 
Government. These, added to the thirteen remaining original 
ones, made the number eighteen. In respect to each of these, 
the Mexican government returned suitable explanations and 
assurances within the time specified. Some of them were 
shown to be unfounded. Others of them required proof. 
Others required further time for investigation. Others of 
them having been investigated, and being found just, the 
claimants should be compensated. Others of them were 
under litigation, and the results would soon be ascertained. 
In one case, an American vessel had been seized by the 
custom-house officers and condemned for want of the proper 
papers, but an appeal having been taken to a higher court, 
before whom the missing papers were produced, the vessel 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 291 

had been discharged. The detention was not the fault of the 
Mexican officers, but of the master of the vessel, in losing 
his papers. In every case the answer appeared to be fair and 
reasonable. Mr. Ellis, nevertheless, as had been determined 
beforehand, demanded his passports and returned home, refu- 
sing to give the Mexican Government a reason for so extra- 
ordinary a course. And on his return home the country was 
made to ring with the falsehood that Mexico had refused to 
pay our just demands ! 

The Mexican Minister, in the meantime, had left Washing- 
ton, on account of the march of American troops into Texas, 
as before related. All diplomatic relations between the two 
republics were thus suspended. American troops were in a 
province claimed by Mexico, and the wishes of the adminis- 
tration seemed about to be realized. Accordingly in Feb., 
1837, President Jackson, in a message to Congress on the 
claims against Mexico, requested an act passed authorizing 
reprisals, and the use of a naval force of the United States 
for that purpose, unless an amicable adjustment could be 
made, upon another demand, to be made on board one of our 
vessels of war on the coast of Mexico ! 

The President evidently intended WAR. Indeed his mes- 
sage affirmed, distinctly, that these injuries justified an " im- 
mediate WAR." But, in a semi-official letter to Governor 
Cannon of Tennessee, only six months before, which had 
somehow got into print, he had distinctly said "It does not 
seem that offenses of this character" (i. e. such as would jus- 
tify war) "have been committed by Mexico." 

But, thanks (under God) to the little band of northern agi- 
tators against slavery, the people of the North were not yet 
prepared for such a measure, and the war proposition of Presi- 
dent Jackson received little favor by their representatives in 
Congress. There needed new machinations and a more favor- 
able opportunity, before the desired result could be reached. 

The treaty between the two countries forbade any act of 
reprisal, by either party, on account of grievances or damages 
until they had been "verified by competent proof" and until 



292 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

the demand for satisfaction "refused, or unreasonably de- 
layed." "We have seen that the eighteen complaints against 
Mexico had not been thus verified, nor had the demand for 
satisfaction been "refused or unreasonably delayed." Yet 
the President, as we have seen, desired authority to make 
" reprisals " unless prompt reparation should be made, on a re- 
newal of the demand from on board one of our armed vessels 
on the coast of Mexico. And in making this request, he laid 
before Congress a list of grievances amounting to forty-six, 
making twenty-eight new cases that had never been presented 
to the Mexican Government at all ! Some of these additional 
claims — strange to tell — dated back as far as 1816 and 1817, 
when Mexico was a province of Spain ! And some of them 
were claims for insurrectionary services against the Spanish 
Government ! 

Mr. Ellis was then re-appointed Minister to Mexico, but he 
remained at home, and a courier was dispatched with the bud- 
get of grievances, with an allowance of one week to examine 
and determine upon them all. By incredible zeal and indus- 
try, the list of grievances was now swelled to fifty-seven. 
This was in July, 1837, under the administration of Mr. Van 
Buren. Many of these demands, as Mr. Jay well observes, 
and has clearly shown, " were in the highest degree insolent 
and ridiculous." 

The messenger to Mexico tarried his "one week" and re- 
turned. But before the list of these fifty-seven grievances 
reached Mexico, the Mexican Government, intent upon an 
equitable settlement of all the difficulties it had heard any- 
thing about, viz. : the eighteen specifications made by Mr. 
Ellis, had passed an act offering to submit to the award of a 
friendly power, the claims of the United States. In the same 
peaceful spirit, another Mexican Minister was sent to Wash- 
ington, and the arbitration proposed, in December, 1837. 

The warlike designs of the Federal Administration were 
thus again baffled. The offer was too fair to be rejected, in 
the face of the nation and the world, yet for four months no 
notice was taken of it, but the new claims were three times 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 293 

distinctly urged by our Secretary, Mr. Forsyth. Not until 
the offer had become public, and Congress plied with northern 
petitions to accept it, and remonstrances against the annexa- 
tion of Texas, was the overture heeded, and negotiations 
commenced. At length an arrangement was made, by which 
the claims were to be presented to Commissioners to sit at 
Washington, two to be appointed by each party ; the board 
to sit not more than eighteen months, the decision of cases 
by it to be final, and the cases on which they could not agree, 
to be determined by an umpire to be named by the King of 
Prussia. 

Here, then, were allowed eighteen months to go through with 
an investigation which Mexico had been required to complete 
in three weelcs ! 

After many delays, the Commission assembled two years 
after their appointment, giving ample time for all the claim 
ants to collect their evidences. 

After sitting nine months, they passed upon all the claims 
that had sufficient vouchers; but, in order to give further 
time for collecting evidence, the Commission was kept open 
the remaining nine months, when it was dissolved. The 
King of Prussia named as umpire his Minister at Washing- 
ton, Baron Roenne. Now notice the result. 

The total amount of claims presented was $11,850,578 

But of these there came, in the last nine 

months, too late to be examined, and evi- 
dently of a speculative and fraudulent 

character, 3,836,837 

Thus reducing the amount to . . $8,513,741 

Referred to Umpire, and undecided by him 
for want of time, 928,627 



Amount of Claims adjudicated, . . $7,585,114 

Rejected by Commissioners and Umpire, . 5,568,975 

Allowed " " " . *2,016,139 

* See Jay's Mexican War, p. 70. The bottom line (allowed) is there stated 



294 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

Just look at it ! Our government had been demanding of 
Mexico nearly twelve millions of dollars , had demanded a prompt 
settlement on pain of "reprisals" and war. And here, after 
the most laborious investigation, and giving ample time, twice 
over, for proving the claims, they are dwindled down to a 
little over two millions, not much more than one-sixth part 
of the claim. It is true that only about seven and a half 
millions were acted upon ; but this was the fault of the claim- 
ants, if they had any valid evidences to bring forward. Again, 
of the claims brought forward in season and investigated, 
viz. : about seven and a half millions, only about one-fourth was 
adjudged to be due. 

The award of over two millions remained unpaid, in conse- 
quence of the pecuniary embarrassments of the Mexican trea- 
sury. Adding to this the amount of claims that had not been 
adjudicated, the Federal Government was furnished with an*- 
other opportunity of urging its claims upon Mexico. Another 
arbitration treaty was negotiated ; the commissioners, for this 
time, were to sit in Mexico, and Mexican citizens having 
claims against the United States were also to have an oppor- 
tunity of presenting their claims for adjudication. One feature 
of the treaty was to change the mode of payment by Mexico, 
from the tender of her depreciated treasury notes to specie 
payments in instalments— an object of great importance to 
our government. And yet, the United States Senate virtually 
rejected the treaty, by changing the place of adjudication 
from Mexico to Washington, and striking out the clause refer- 
ring the Mexican claims on the United States to the tribunal 
of arbitration. Thus mutilated, and divested of its reciprocal 
character, the treaty was returned to Mexico, where no further 
notice was taken of it. 

So much for our claims against Mexico. Except for delay 
of payment growing out of its poverty, it does not appear that 
there was any backwardness on the part of the Mexican Gov- 



2,026,230, which does not agree with the arithmetical subtraction, owing probably 
to a misprint. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 295 

eminent to do all that could reasonably be asked at its bands. 
And this is the sura total of all our causes of war against 
Mexico — a war for the collection of a debt of about two mil- 
lions, and a pretended debt of about five or six millions more,* 
the proper adjustment of which had never been refused or 
needlessly delayed. And this debt was collected, by the war 
process, at an expense of above one hundred millions of dol- 
lars! 

It was territory, not money, that the Federal Government 
wanted of Mexico, and territory for the extension of slavery. 
Every step in the entire process affords evidence of this. 

Under the administration of Mr. Tyler, in December, 1841, 
Mr. Upshur, Secretary of the Navy, made a report, recom- 
mending the employment of a naval force in the Pacific, on 
the coast of California, to protect " a considerable settlement 
of Americans " in Upper California, to explore the Gulf of 
California, &c. A few days after, Commodore Jones, a Vir- 
ginian, was dispatched with a squadron accordingly, where he 
arrived in 1842. On receiving a newspaper report that Mexi- 
co had ceded California to England — one of the lying rumors 
of the day, for effect — learning, likewise from the Mexican 
papers that the government of that country* had protested 
against American interference with Texas, and suspecting that 
a British naval force then in the Pacific was about to seize 
upon California, Com. Jones, on consultation with his officers, 
assumed the responsibility of taking possession of Monterey 
in California. lie had brought with him, either from the 
United States or from Callao, a supply of printed proclamations, 
in the Spanish language, claiming the people "henceforth and 
forever " as citizens under the protection of the American flag. 

The day after distributing his proclamation, the Commodore 
discovered his mistake. The report was a fabrication. The 
fruit was not yet ripe. lie apologized to the Mexican authori- 
ties of Monterey, and withdrew. The Federal Government 
was obliged to disavow the act, but "in vain was his punish- 

* The reader will find evidences of the character of these claims as we proceed. 



296 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

merit demanded by Mexico. " He was too faithful a represen- 
tative of his government to fall under its censures. He had 
only mistaken the time to strike. 

The refusal of Mexico to acknowledge the independence of 
Texas was an obstacle, in the minds of the Northern people, 
to the annexation of the latter, and hence the Senate, as we 
have seen, had refused the ratification of Messrs. Tyler and 
Calhoun's treaty for that object. The next step was to intimi- 
date Mexico into a recognition of Texan independence. Ac- 
cordingly, in October, 1844, our Minister to Mexico, Mr. Shan- 
non, in conformity with his instructions, presented an insolent 
remonstrance on that subject. In reference to a projected 
attempt of Mexico to reduce her refractory province, Mr. Shan- 
non represented the importance of Texas to this country, and 
intimated that his Government could not see it invaded, with 
out taking part in the controversy. The Mexican Minister 
replied that his government was not capable of yielding to a 
menace which the President of the United States, " exceeding 
the powers given to him by the fundamental law of his nation, has 
directed against it." 

He added : 

"While one power is seeking more ground to stain by the slavery of an 
unfortunate branch of the human family, the other is endeavoring, by pre- 
serving what belongs to it, to diminish the surface which the former wants 
for this detestable traffic. Let the world now say which of the two has jus- 
tice and reason on its side." 

Mr. Shannon demanded a retraction of this language. The 
Mexican Government nobly refused to retract, but repeated 
it. And President Tyler laid the correspondence before Con- 
gress, complaining of the language of the Mexican Govern- 
ment as an affront, that " might well justify the United States 
in a resort to any measure to vindicate the national honor." 
He contented himself, however, with urging " prompt and 
immediate action on the subject of annexation." 

The successful annexation of Texas in 1845, encouraged the 
slaveholding party in Congress to broach, openly, the project 
of entering into negotiations for the cession of Cuba. Their 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 297 

papers began also to dwell on the importance of adding Cali- 
fornia to the United States, and President Polk was evidently 
determined to obtain that province, either by negotiation or 
war. A new bluster was made about our claims upon Mexi- 
co, and Mr. Slidell was dispatched on a mission to that Gov- 
ernment to make an offer for New Mexico and California. He 
was to offer tlie claims and Jive millions for New Mexico, and 
the claims and twenty-five millions for both New Mexico and 
California. 

To facilitate this land speculation, " the claims" were conve- 
niently swelled to upwards of eight millions, although Mexico 
had paid the interest of the award, and above three hundred 
thousand dollars of the principal, by forced loans, and not- 
withstanding her financial embarrassments, so anxious was she 
to retain her relations of peace with this country. 

The award under the treaty, as before stated, 

was above - $2,000,000 

Claims then unsettled were above - - 4,000,000 

New claims presented, above - - 2,000,000 

Amount due (after deducting payments) about $8,000,000 



Let it now be remembered that the previous 
claim of our Government upon Mexico 
was nearly - - - $12,000,000 

Add to this, the new claims afterwards fabrica- 
ted as above, - - - 2,000,000 



Total claim from Mexico, - $14,000,000 



How much ought to have been claimed the reader will judge 
when he sees, not only (as already exhibited) the amount of 
above five and a half millions rejected by the Commissioners 
and Umpire, but when he sees, likewise, how the whole mat- 
ter was settled when Mexico was afterwards dismembered by 
our forces, when we had her in our power, and when we had 
obtained all the slave territory we wanted ! We could afford 
to be honest then, in respect to these claims. In the final set- 



29S GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

tlement, at the close of the war, the award of the Commis- 
sioners was put down at two millions of dollars, and the 
remainder of the claim, above six millions, was put down at 
only three and A quarter millions, the Federal Government 
stipulating to pay the claimants all "valid claims" not exceed- 
ing the latter sum, yet releasing the Mexican Government 
from further responsibility ! Thus our Government itself re- 
pudiated above three millions. But this is not all. As five- 
sevenths of the claims investigated were found spurious, and 
as the claims presented later were evidently of a still worse 
character, it is calculated by Judge Jay, who has presented 
and studied these statistics, that " one million will be more 
than sufficient to meet every equitable demand," that is (as 
we understand it) in addition to the award of two millions ; 
thus reducing the fourteen millions claimed, to three mil- 
lions, and repudiating eleven millions of it as spurious ! — 
Jay's Mexican War, p. 118. 

Such were " the claims " of which eight millions were to 
be used as purchase money to obtain California and New 
Mexico, through the mission of Mr. Slidell. In his person, 
the American Government presented itself before Mexico in 
the character of an importunate creditor demanding more than 
double his just due, with a bowie knife in one hand and a 
purse, with his bill, in the other. Now, says he, sell me half 
of your land at my own price, and take this purse and my 
bill receipted, for your pay. If not, receive this knife into 
your bosom. The offer of Mr. Slidell was rejected, as was 
foreseen, and he returned home. The correspondence, with 
the attendant circumstances, betray the extreme anxiety of 
the Federal Administration to provoke Mexico into a war, 
and raise a clamor against her in this country. 

Another occasion or pretext of quarrel with Mexico was 
sought in a pretended question respecting the western boun- 
dary of Texas. Mr. Jay has clearly shown that the acts of 
this Government had recognized, in several ways, a boundary 
far to the eastward of that which, on his accession to the 
Presidency, about the time of the annexation of Texas, was 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 299 

resolutely maintained, and with a military force, by President 
Polk. Under pretense of defending Texas, which needed no 
defense, General Taylor was stationed beyond the real borders 
of Texas, with discretion even to cross the Rio Grande, the 
new boundary now claimed by the President, in case hostili- 
ties were commenced by Mexico. The slightest skirmish on 
the newly claimed territory, would sufficiently answer the 
purpose of throwing on Mexico the odium of commencing 
the war. All this was sheer Executive usurpation, without 
the authority or knowledge of Congress. In the meantime, 

1 five states were required to be in readiness to furnish aid to 
Gen. Taylor, though the documents show that our Cabinet 
were not under the least apprehension of any invasion from 
Mexico. 

On the very next day after the reception at Washington of 
advices from Mr. Slidell, Jan. 12, 1846, from which it was 
inferred, that there was no hope of a cession of California, 
peremptory orders were given to Gen. Taylor to advance to 

; the Eio Grande, and the " points opposite Metamoras and 
Mier, and the vicinity of Laredo, were suggested for his con- 
sideration." The evident object was to provoke a collision. 
After a variety of ineffectual manoeuvres to provoke the Mex- 
icans to strike the first blow, it was in fact given by our own 
army, and Gen. Taylor announced to his government that 

. hostilities had commenced ; on the receipt of which Presi- 
dent Polk announced to Congress and to the world the untruth 
that " Mexico had passed the boundary of the United States, had 
invaded our territory, and shed American blood on American soil. 1 ' 
Congress, thereupon, (rejecting a motion to read the docu- 
ments) and sustaining a call for the "previous question,'' 
which precluded discussion, adopted a vote asserting the ex- 
istence of war by act of Mexico! This was on May 11, 1846, 

j the same day the House received the President's war message ! 

Gen. Taylor immediately took possession of Metamoras; 

and the war was vigorously pushed westward to its intended 

•destination, the conquest of New Mexico and California. 

| In anticipation of these military movements, by land, a na- 



300 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

val force had been stationed in the Pacific, near the coast of 
California, with secret orders to Com. Sloat, June 24th, 1845, 
to possess the port of San Francisco, and blockade or occupy 
other ports, as soon as he should hear of an inland war zoith 
Mexico. These orders were now carried into effect, possession i 
taken of Monterey, and a proclamation immediately issued < 
announcing that " California now belongs to the United States." \ 
This was on the 7th of July, 1846. Two days after, Sam 
Francisco was also in our possession. All this in less than I 
two months after the declaration of war by Congress, plainly 
showing that the conquest of California had been determined i 
upon and provided for, a year beforehand, and while neither 
the people of the United States nor Congress were permitted 
to know the designs of the President. The declaration of war 
by Congress did not reach the squadron in the Pacific till the 
28th of August, fifty-two days after the Commodore, by pro- 
clamation, had annexed California to the United States. 

Another incident illustrates the same general fact. A par- 
ty of adventurers, overland, under Col. Fremont, of the Uni- 
ted States' army, ostensibly set out on an exploring expedition 
to Oregon, but in reality destined to aid in the conquest of 
California, arrived there, among " the American settlers," and 
commenced his revolutionary movements a little in advance 
of the invasion by the Commodore. The little settlement 
proclaimed the independence of California. The new repub- 
lic existed only four days, the insurrection very readily merg- 
ing itself in the Commodore's proclamation of annexation to 
the United States. Col. Fremont afterwards presented pecu- 
niary claims upon our Government for services in California, 
and the investigation drew out the fact that he had acted in 
accordance with the designs of our Cabinet, through whose 
misrepresentations of the matter it had however been sup- 
posed that he had acted on his own responsibility. 

Mr. Jay introduces into his volume some confessions of Mr. 
Thompson, our Minister in Mexico, clearly showing the designs 
of the Federal Government, in 1843, under the administration 
of Mr. Tyler, to get possession of California, and to provoke 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 301 

Mexico into a war for that purpose.* lie cites also Mr. Cal- 
houn, as having said in the Senate of the U. S., Feb. 24, 
1847, (in reference to the precipitate action of Congress in de- 
claring, May 11, 1846, that " war existed by act of Mexico") — 
" We had not a particle of evidence that the Republic of Mexico 
\fiad made war against the United States"-f Mr. C. J. Ingersol, 
as chairman of the Committee on Foreign Relations, in Feb., 
1847, made a report avowing the sentiment that the war was 
'necessary, in order to get possession of territories that " every 
.American administration has been striving to get by purchase."^ 
And in the same report, as well as in a previous speech. (Jan. 
19th) in the House, Mr. Ingersol has the robber-like effrontery 
io throw the blame of the war and its continuance upon Mex- 
ico, because she refused to sell us her provinces, which, says 
ie, " she has now constrained us to take by force, though even yet 
We are disposed to pay for them, not by blood merely, but by money 
oo/"§ Mr. Stanton of Tennessee, Mr. Beddinger of Virginia, 
Mr. Sevier of Arkansas, and Mr. Giles of Maryland, openly 
avowed, on the floor of Congress, that the war was a war of 
conquest. Mr. Polk had, however, in his message, a little 
i.ime previous, adventured the extraordinary assertion, that 
( ( the war has not been waged with a view to conquest." In 
;?cho to this declaration, a resolution was introduced in the 
.House (Jan., 1847), disclaiming a view to conquest, but the 
House refused to adopt the resolution. The Southern press 
abounded in gratulations at the prospect of conquest, and of 
he extension of slavery. Henry Clay, in a speech in Ken- 
tucky, declared that the bill of Congress, of May 11, 1846, 
1 attributing the commencement of the war to the act of 
Mexico," was "a bill with a palpable falsehood stamped 
[m its face."j| A new House of Representatives, "fresh from 
he people," elected after the declaration of May 11, 1S46, 
,' Resolved," in the December following, "that the war was 
•ainecessarily and unconstitutionally begun by the President of the 

r— . 



I * Jay's Mexican War, pp. 108-9. t lb., p. 161. % lb., p. 164. 

. S Jay 8 Mexico, p. 164. App. to Cong. Globe, 1347, p. 125. \ lb., p. 285. 



302 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

United States."* That portions of Mexico, including Califor- 
nia, were unconstitutionally conquered, and treated and gov- 
erned as conquered territory by the President, before the 
treaty of peace, was strongly affirmed and clearly shown in 
the TJ. S. Senate, in March, 1848, by both. Mr. Webster and 
Mr. Calhoun.f 

Of the manner in which the war was prosecuted, we have 
not room to say much. The reader of Mr. Jay's Review will 
find some sickening details of lawlessness, of rapacity, of 
plunder, and of outrage, disgraceful to the American name. 
Barbarities were committed which should make humanity 
weep and blush. General Taylor himself, in a communica- 
tion to the War Department, said : 

" I deeply regret to report that many of the twelve months' volunteers, in 
their route hence of the lower Rio Grande, have committed extensive outrages 
and depredations upon the peaceable inhabitants. There is scarcely any 

FORM OF CRIME THAT HAS NOT BEEN REPORTED TO ME AS COMMITTED BY 
THEM." 

General Kearney communicated a similar statement. The 
Californians, he says, "have been shame/idly abused by our own 
people.' 1 '' 

When such testimonies come from sucli witnesses, we may 
conjecture the rest. 

But depredations on private property were not confined to 
the soldiers. Gen. Scott, by proclamation, assessed provinces' 
and cities at his pleasure, on the following conditions: 

" Ou the failure of any State to pay its assessments, its functionaries, as 
above, will be seized and imprisoned, and their property seized 

REGISTERED, AND REPORTED, AND CONVERTED TO THE USE OF THE occupa- 
tion, in strict accordance with the general regulations of this army." 

No resignation of office was to excuse them, and if th( 
money was not promptly raised, the commander woulc 
" immediately proceed to collect, from the wealthier inhabitant 
(other than neutral friends) within his reach, the amount of tin 
assessment due from the State." And this was according t< 

* Jay's Mexico, p. 254. + lb., pp. 246-7. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 303 

. instructions from Pres. Polk, without the authority of Con- 

gross. A million of dollars were extorted from the Mexicans 

, in this way, and three gambling-houses were licensed in the 

capital, by the American commander-in-chief, in consideration 

of the annual payment of eighteen thousand dollars ! Pillage, 

desolation, violence, vice, crime, demoralization, and death, 

kept equal march with the progress of the American arms. 

The Congress that had declared the beginning of the war 

I unconstitutional, and the members who had denounced the 

> measure as criminal and wicked, were nevertheless so corrupt 

\ and hardened as to vote money for its continuance ! A few 

, only had the consistency and honesty to record their votes in 

' the negative. 

Though Mr. Polk had declared our title to the whole of 
i Oregon to be "clear and unquestionable," yet he had surren- 
dered much of it to Great Britain, to maintain relations of 
; peace. For Oregon was too far North for the convenient use 
! of the slaveholders, and it might be made into free States. 
^But without the slightest claim to New Mexico and California, 
; he prosecuted a war of conquest to obtain them, because the 
slaveholders desired them, and they were expected to add to 
,the number of slave States, to help govern the Union. These 
objects were openly avowed by the Southern press. 

All wars of conquest have their limits. It is not certain 
(that the administration sought to conquer and retain all 
Mexico. The central and southern provinces might be diffi- 
cult to be managed — might be found too populous and too 
. refractory to admit, at present, the quiet restoration of slavery, 
The war was expensive. The administration (and partly on 
account of the war, and its attendant usurpations) was becom- 
ing unpopular. Desirous of securing permanently what was 
in his power, and what was originally contemplated by the 
i war, Mr. Polk turned his thoughts on peace. For this pur- 
pose, Aug. 8, 18-46, he recommended to Congress an appro- 
priation of two millions of dollars, to be placed at his disposal 
for that purpose, This request plainly indicated his desire to 
make an offer of money for a cession of territory, and gave 



304: GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

the lie to his former pretense, that war was not waged for 
conquest. A bill was introduced into the House for this 
object, and was passed, but with the celebrated proviso offered 
by Mr. Wilmot, that the territory thus acquired should be 
free from the polluting touch of slavery. The bill went to 
the Senate the last day of the session, but was not acted upon, 
and Congress adjourned. 

At the next session, the President's application was renewed, 
but asking now for three millions. A bill was introduced 
into the House for that object, and this opened the way for 
another introduction of the proviso against slavery. A stormy 
debate ensued. The Southern members were enraged, declar- 
ing they would have no territory under such restrictions, and 
threatening, as usual, a dissolution of the Union. The bill 
was nevertheless passed, and with the proviso, by a vote of 
115 to 106. In the Senate, the proviso was stricken out, 31 
to 21. Returning back to the House, the proviso was finally 
dropped, 102 to 97, no less than 22 members absenting them- 
selves. But though now rejected, the proviso might after- 
wards be applied, in providing for the government of the ter- 
ritories. This, the friends of liberty contemplated, and this, 
the slave party feared. 

Under this state of things, a great demonstration of senti- 
ment, by public meetings, was got up at the South. Legisla- 
tures fulminated their Resolves against the proviso, and the 
line of the Missouri compromise 36° 30', began to be proposed 
by the more moderate. 

In August, 1847, negotiations were opened with Mexico 
through our agent, Mr. Trist. The Mexican Commissioners 
were instructed, by their government to insist that " the Uni- 
ted States shall engage not to permit slavery in that part of 
the territory which they shall acquire by treaty." Mr. Trist 
promptly refused to negotiate a treaty under such restrictions, 
declaring them as obnoxious as "an order to establish the in- 
quisition," that " the bare mention of such a treaty was an 
impossibility," and that no American President " would dare 
to present any such treaty to the Senate." 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 305 

" I assured them," says Mr. Trist, (in his official dispatch to our Secretary 
of State,) " that if it were in their power to offer me the whole territory de- 
scribed in our project, increased ten-fold in value, and, in addition to that, 
covered a foot thick all over with pure gold, upon the single condition 

THAT SLAVERY SHOULD BE EXCLUDED THEKEKKOM, I COllld not entertain the 

offer for a moment, nor even think of communicating it to Washington." 

A previous attempt at negotiation for peace had been abor- 
tive, because Mexico had declined to cede all New Mexico, 
and Upper and Lower California. 

In the final close of the Mexican war, these territories were 
obtained at a cost of fifteen millions of dollars paid to 
Mexico, in addition to the relinquishment of our long-contest- 
ed " claims." Besides this, the direct expenditures of the war 
are estimated at over one hundred millions. Adding extra 
pay, pensions, bounties of land, &c., Mr. Jay puts down the 
money cost of our new territory at one hundred and thirty 
millions of dollars. And all this to extend the area of 
slavery beyond Texas. 



20 



306 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 



CHAPTER XXVII. 

FURTHER ACTION OF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT — RESULT OF 
THE CONQUEST OF CALIFORNIA — ITS ADMISSION AS A FREE 
STATE — " THE COMPROMISE." 

Renewed demand for the " Wilmot Proviso" — Southern cry of " non-intervention" 
— Attempt, in Dec., 1848, to introduce California as a State— Attempt to clothe 
the President with despotic power over the conquered provinces — No government 
provided for them— California forms for herself a provisional Government— Scheme 
of the South of bringing in California as a State without restriction — Mission of 
Thoma9 Butler King from the Cabinet at Washington — Usurpations of General 
Riley — His Proclamation to choose delegates to form a Constitution — The Califor- 
nians comply, and form a Constitution prohibiting Slavery! — Sudden change at 
the South — Opposition to the admission of California — Controversy in Congress — 
New Mexico follows the example of California, and asks admission, without Sla- 
very — Demands of Texas on Territory of New Mexico — Mr. Clay's plan of " Com- 
promise," nominally defeated, but substantially carried — Admission of California 
as a free State — Territorial Government provided for New Mexico and Utah, with- 
out restriction — Boundary of Texas adjusted — Slave trade abolished in the Federal 
District — New Fugitive Slave Bill (1850) — Its infamous provisions. 

There is an overruling Providence that defeats the plans 
of oppressors, and covers the councils of the crafty with con- 
fusion. A more remarkable illustration of this consolatory 
truth is seldom furnished than in the winding up of the his- 
torical drama of the Mexican war. Should kindred arts 
seem to succeed in future, we may trust that the same benefi- 
cent Providence will, in the end, triumph. 

At the very moment when the wishes of the slave power 
seemed about to be consummated, a new obstacle presented 
itself, as already seen, in the Wilmot proviso, that threatened 
to exclude slavery from the conquered and purchased pro- 
vinces. This proviso, twice adopted in the House of Represen- 
tatives, in response to the voice of the people, had been 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 307 

smothered in the more aristocratic Senate, and by extraordi- 
nary arts of intimidation, corruption, and management, had, 
at last, been deserted, for the moment, by a small majority of 
the Representatives. But the spirit of the people was roused, 
and throughout the Free States, the indispensable condition 
of support at the polls, was the profession, on the part of the 
candidate, of sustaining the proviso. The rival Whig and 
Democratic parties vied with each other in these professions. 
The last session of Congress under President Polk's adminis 
tration, was expected to grapple with this question, and give 
it a final decision, in the act of providing, in accordance with 
usage, for the government of newly acquired territories. 

So wide spread and so unequivocal was the expression of 
this sentiment, that " no less than fourteen States protested 
through their legislatures against any enlargement of the area 
of slavery," and even the " voice of Daniel Webster was 
raised to warn his countrymen of the impending calamity."* 

Alarmed at this aspect of things, and fearing to meet the 
question again in Congress in that shape, the leaders of the 
slave party resorted to a new stratagem. They determined 
to forestal any action by Congress for the government of the 
territories, by urging their immediate admission as States, with 
the right of shaping their domestic institutions as they pleased. 
The doctrine of "non-intervention" was now the watchword, 
and it was acceptable to those numerous Northern politicians, 
in Congress, who wished for a pretext to dodge a direct vote 
on the proviso. If the principle of throwing the responsibility 
upon the new States were admitted, it would relieve them from 
the responsibility, and shelter them, in some degree, from the 
displeasure of their constituents at home.f The democratic 

* Address on behalf Am. & For. A. S. Soe., p. 2. 

t The real spirit of their pledges and professions would indeed oblige them to 
vote against the admission of a new State whose Constitution did not exclude slavery. 
But the doctrine of " non-intervention," deriving its plausibility from the demo- 
cratic theory of leaving the people of the States to govern themselves, would relieve 
their embarrassment. The sophistry lay in forgetting that the slaves are a part of 
" the people," and that the business of majorities wielding civil government, is to 
protect the equal rights of all. 



308 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

candidate for the Presidency, General Cass, had occupied this 
ground. The whig candidate, General Taylor, though not 
publicly pledged, had been represented, by his friends at the 
North, as not being disposed to veto the proviso, and being 
now about to take the Presidential chair, the prospective alter- 
native of being obliged to commit himself on that point, was 
disagreeable to him, and especially to his party. All tLis 
favored the new plot of the slave interest. 

In the early part of the session, Dec. 11th, 1848, a bill was 
introduced into the Senate by Mr. Douglas of Illinois, for the 
admission of California as a State, which was read twice and 
ordered to be printed. The boundaries were to include " all 
that portion of territory which was acquired by the treaty of 
peace, &c, with Mexico," Congress reserving the right to form 
new states out of it.* This would include all of Utah and 
all of New Mexico that was not intended to be absorbed by 
Texas ! It was soon found that this project would not suc- 
ceed; but Mr. Douglas presented a new bill in another form, 
leaving New Mexico out of the question. These bills con- 
tained, of course, no interdict of slavery.f 

Mr. Foote of Mississippi, on the introduction of the first 
bill, seemed anxious to be considered as its author, and it 
doubtless had its origin with slaveholders. The Washington 
Union, the special organ of President Polk, advocated the 
second bill, and answered the objections of some southern 
members against it4 In the House, Mr. Hilliard proposed a 
similar bill. . The project underwent various modifications, 
and finally, near the close of the session, a substitute for them 
all came under debate in the Appropriation Bill, and the 
amendment of Mr. Walker of Wisconsin, which provided for 
the despotic government of the territories by the President, 
at his discretion, and without any restriction in respect to 
slavery. It contained, likewise, a virtual concession of the 
claims of slaveholding Texas to all the territory of New 



* National Era, Dec. 14, 1848. t lb., Jan. 25 and Feb. 1, 1849. 

\ lb., Feb. 22, 1849. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 309 

Mexico cast of the Rio Grande, and it transferred to Califor- 
nia certain laws regulating the domestic slave trade on the 
Atlantic seaboard. All this was passed in the Senate 29 to 
27 — absent 4,* — but was defeated in the House. 

The session was thus occupied in a manner that staved off 
direct action on the proviso, but neither provided for the 
government of the acquired provinces as territories, nor ad- 
mitted them into the Union as states. Being thus left un- 
provided for, in a condition bordering on anarchy and under 
military misrule, the Californians established for themselves a 
Provisional Government, and elected an Assembly, in Feb., 
1849. In the United States, the controversy was still unde- 
cided, neither the friends nor the opponents of slavery exten- 
sion having carried any decisive measure. 

On the accession of President Taylor. March 4, 1849, the 

■ policy of his administration, from which there appears to have 
been, at that time, no dissent among the friends of slavery 

; extension, was evidently to facilitate and hasten the organiza- 

; tion of a State Government in California, without a prohibi- 
tion of slavery, and bring her forward with her new constitu- 

| tion at the next session, for admission into the Union. u Kon 
intervention " was now the doctrine of the entire South, and 
of its Northern allies. The party supporting President Tay 
lor, even including that large and influential portion of it at 



* National Era, March 1 and 8. It is proper to add that only seven senators from 
the tree States voted in the affirmative, viz : Messrs. Dickinson of N. York, Dodge 
of Iowa, Douglas of Illinois, Fitzgerald of Michigan, Ilaunegan of Indiana, Sturgeon 
of Pennsylvania, and Walker of Wisconsin. 

Mr. Hannegan was immediately appointed by Prcs. Folk, Minister to Berlin (one 
of the la.«t acts of his administration), and (it is said) with the concurrence and 
advice of leading friends of the President elect (Gen. Taylor), who was known to 
have used his influence with members of Congress before his inauguration, in favor 
of Walker's amendment, thus showing the united sympathy of the two slaveholding 
Presidents with that measure, as a substitute for the defeated project of immediately 
admitting California, without restriction, as a State. Gen. Taylor's earnest desire 
for such admission was affirmed by the editor of the National Intelligencer, in a 
labored article in support of that policy, in which it was maintained that as soon as 
California should present herself with a Constitution, asking admission, Congress 
tr-ovld have no right and no pretense to interfere in. the slave question. — See iV. Y. 
Evening Post, Nov. 15, 1849. 



310 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

the North, that had abounded in anti-slavery professions, and 
had carried elections on the merit of its zeal for the Wilmot 
proviso, began now to represent that the measure was not im- 
portant — that Mexican law remaining in force and not re- 
pealed, would be a sufficient guaranty of liberty, or that the 
climate and other similar causes would prevent slavery — and 
finally, that if California should present herself with a consti- 
tution containing no prohibition of slavery, she would be 
entitled to admission. In absence of other evidence, the 
policy of the administration and of the slaveholders would 
have been sufficiently apparent from these indications. But 
other facts are at hand. 

In the Cabinet, the slave interest was predominant. Mr. 
Preston of Virginia, Mr. Crawford of Georgia, Mr. Johnson 
of Maryland, were slaveholders. John M. Clayton, Secretary 
of State, was accustomed to compromises with slavery, and 
solicitous to pursue a course that would prevent agitation, 
while not one of the remaining members, Meredith, Colla- 
more, and Ewing, were counted upon by the advocates of 
freedom. The course of such a cabinet might well be sup- 
posed (in the absence of any opposition) to represent the 
policy of the. South. 

By this President and Cabinet, Thomas Butler King of 
Georgia, member of Congress, an earnest advocate of slavery 
extension, and a slaveholder, was dispatched on a special 
mission to California. No sooner was he arrived there than 
he was found urging the people " to form a State Government, 
pledging the support of the administration in the movement, 
and insisting that the measure was necessary to save Congress 
and the old states from a fearful struggle on the subject of 
slavery."* And Mr. King stood not alone. Along with him 
(whether as volunteers or emissaries from the southern coun- 
try) there were Hon. Wm. M. Gwin of Mississippi, ex-member 
of Congress, Ex-Governor Boggs, and Peter H. Burnett, of 
Missouri, &c, exerting a similar influence, — Governor Boggs 

* National Era, Aug. 7, 1849. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 311 

writing home to his friends that a few slaves could be used to 
advantage in the territory.* 

A public meeting was held at San Jose, which was ad- 
dressed by Mr. King and Mr. Gwin. 

Mr. King related the history of the Wilmot proviso, and 
the divisions growing out of it, and said : 

" We cannot settle this question on the other side of the Rocky Moun- 
tains. We look to you to settle it by becoming a State. The people of 
the old States ardently desire it." 

He then added, — 

" I speak knowingly, when I say the Administration desire it ; and from 
extensive intercourse with the members of the last Congress, I am convinced 
they are most anxious for the question to be settled in this way. You will 
have no difficulty in being admitted as a State. I pledge myself to it, and 
1 pledge the Administration, and I think may speak equally confidently for 
the next Congress. Form a State Government, send on your senators and 
representatives, and then admission is certain." 

Mr. Gwin followed in a strain still more unreserved. He 
represented that a "spirit of fanaticism" in Congress had pre- 
vented, for two sessions, the provision of any form of govern- 
ment for California, and intimated that "the steadfast friends 
of California" were those who were opposed to this fanaticism. 
lie was not so sanguine as Mr. King of their ready admission 
as a state. He feared "we will have to pass through an ar- 
duous struggle before we obtain our rights," — insinuating that 
the " spirit of fanaticism " at the North would oppose the ad- 
mission. " I do not refer to these difficulties," said he, " to 
deter us from acting. Let all minor questions be merged in the 
great question before us" . . "dropping all local questions that may 
excite angry discussions" &c. &c. 

The drift of this advice was not misunderstood, nor the 
quarter from whence it came. Col. Hand, one of the speakers 
at the same meeting, administered a timely rebuke. After 
denouncing the usurpation of Gen. Riley, he said : 

" Let the manaic politicians of the Atlantic, who have so kindly volun- 
* National Era, Oct. 25, 1849. 



312 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

teered to teach us semi-barbarians the duty we owe to our would-be leaders, 
remain at home, and when, after a residence of five days in California, they 
again attempt to feel the popular pulse in regard to slavery, let your indig- 
nation at their uncalled for interference be expressed in such a manner that 
Gov. Clayton cannot again say, without telling an unblushing falsehood, we 
are incapable of self-government."* 

The friends of liberty at the East had no members or ex- 
members of Congress at this meeting, to counteract the influ- 
ences exerted there. The administration, however, had other 
instruments to do its bidding. Gen. Riley, acting under or- 
ders of our Federal Executive, was the well-known autocrat 
of California. The provisional government had not recognized 
his authority, but were in possession of no organized means of 
resisting his usurpations. His authority was however des- 
tined, for once, to facilitate a better organization. In strict 
accordance with its settled policy, as already exhibited, the 
Cabinet at Washington instructed Gen. Rileyf to issue a Pro- 
clamation directing the choosing of delegates to form a State 
Constitution, which was accordingly done, — the terms of the 
Proclamation prescribing the time and mode of elections, and 
even assuming the existence of slavery, by making a distinction 
between bond and free, in defining who should be electors.^ 
This specification was founded, doubtless, on the fact, that 
slaves were then in the territory and in process of not infre- 
quent introduction there by slaveholding immigrants, a fact 
very generally understood. The Alabama Journal had de- 
clared that the experiment had been tested, that slaves' had 
been carried there and were held in safety, and it urged the 
" slaveholders to emigrate there with their property in suffi- 
cient numbers to control the policy of the country."§ Gen. 
Riley likewise " apportioned the delegates so as to throw the 



* National Era, Aug. 7, 1849. 

t We have met with no contradiction or disclaimer of this alleged action of the 
administration on the part of Pres. Taylor or his friends, Northern or Southern, 
though it has been made the subject of free animadversion by opposite classes of 
citizens, first at the North, and afterwards at the South. 

X See N. Y. Weekly Evening Post, Nov. 15, 1840. 

§ National Era, Nov. 1, 1849. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 313 

weight of political power into the towns where the officers 
and dependents of the United States Government exercised 
most influence."* 

The Provisional Government, which had been but feebly 
sustained, considered it the best policy to acquiesce in this 
movement of Gen. Riley, and the Assembly therefore ceased 
to cxist.f The delegates were accordingly elected and assem- 
bled in convention at Monterey, Sept. 1, 1849. 

Up to this time, nay, on the receipt of this intelligence at 
"Washington and New York, about the middle of October, and 
for some time afterwards, the common impression among all 
classes in the States was, that the new Constitution of Califor- 
nia would contain no prohibition of slavery ; that a slavehold- 
ing population from the southern states would rapidly rush 
in, that the effort for the admission of the new slave State into 
the Union would be vigorously pushed, and would most pro- 
bably succeed. The tone of the journals opposed to the ex- 
tension of slavery was generally marked by apprehensions of 
this character,:}: while the southern editors heralded the pass- 
ing events with an air of assurance and satisfaction. It was 
known, indeed, that some of the inhabitants of California 
were opposed to slavery, but the controlling influences were 
supposed to be on the other side. Mr. Gwin, it was predicted, 
would be President of the Constitutional Convention. The 
pro-slavery ticket had triumphed in San Francisco. Thomas 
Butler King, Mr. Gwin, and Ex-Governor Boggs of Missouri, 
and Ex-Governor Shannon, a pro-slavery democrat, were the 
prominent candidates for Senators, from the new State.§ Had 
John C. Calhoun, and other statesmen of that stamp, enter- 
tained any serious apprehensions of a prohibition of slavery 
by the Constitution of California, it is not to be supposed that 



* National Era, Aug. 7, 18-49. 

t Alta California of July 26, copied into N. Y. Weekly Evening- Post of Sept. 
20, 1849. 

X Witness the .V. Y. Weelly Evening rost, of Oct. 18, 1849, and National Era of 
Oct. 25 and Nov. 1. 

§ National Era of Oct. 25, 1849. 



314 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

they would have been silent while these measures were in 
progress. As it was, the country heard nothing of their com- 
plaints against the administration, till the result of its policy 
disappointed them. 

Few items of newspaper intelligence ever took the Ameri- 
can people more completely by surprise than the following in 
the new Constitution of California : 

" Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except for the pun- 
ishment OF CRIME, SHALL EVER BE TOLERATED IN THIS STATE." 

The public mind was not relieved of suspense, till the ac- 
ceptance of this Constitution by the people was, some weeks 
afterward, ascertained. 

The result is to be traced to a number of causes, neither 
foreseen nor understood in the United States, till the result 
had developed them. The immigration from the South ap- 
pears to have been less extensive than had been supposed, 
owing to apprehensions on the part of slaveholders, that the 
Wilmot proviso would be applied to the territory, or that 
California would not be admitted, as a slave state. Of the 
southern settlers, some too, had come there for the very 
purpose of escaping from the blight of slavery, and others 
who had come to explore the country, leaving their slaves 
behind them, were content, on observation and reflection, to 
try a new order of things. A preponderating population had 
poured in from the free States, in quest of California gold, 
some few of whom were opposed to slavery on principle, and 
most of them, enlightened by the recent discussions at the 
north, on that subject, understood the irreconcilable antago- 
nism between free and slave labor. As their chief capital 
was their own industry, they knew better than to welcome 
the competition of unpaid laborers, and the affinity of free 
laborers with slaves. Commercial adventurers understood 
that free labor was the only substantial element of enduring 
wealth. Politicians and editors, and through them the whole 
community, knew that the admission of California as a slave 
state would be opposed by the moral stamina of the North 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 315 

and the North-West.* Add to all this, the Californians had 
had a taste of the autocratic control of the Slave Power, under 
the military despotism that had been provided for them ; the 
original inhabitants had no affection for the invaders who had 
conquered them, and all except the interested few had been 
disgusted by the air of superiority and dictation that had 
been displayed by the slaveholders who had just come among 
them, to prescribe for them, as by authority from Washington, 
what institutions they should frame. 

A review of this result shows us that, in more ways than 
one, the anti-slavery agitation at the North had contributed 
largely to shape the public sentiment and the destinies of Cal- 
ifornia. The wisdom of the masses of people in that territory, 
heterogeneous and undirected as they were, in deciding so 
correctly and so promptly the great moral, economical, and po- 
litical problem that still perplexes the precedent-ridden and 
demagogue-befooled citizens of the old states, presents a splen- 
did exemplification of the safety of the democratic principle, 
under the Providence of God, and illustrates the great foun- 
dation truth of religion and morality, that the moral sense, in 
man, left to itself, and acting freely, without bias, is often 
found a safe guide, in cases that baffle the skill and confound 
the calculations of the crafty.f 

The doctrine of " non-intervention," so sedulously cultiva- 
ted, demanded now the prompt admission of California as a 
free state ! But the demand was destined to knock at bolted 
doors. President Taylor indeed, and the northern wing of 
his party, desirous of his re-election and their own preserved 
power, were in no condition to repudiate their own doctrine 
and eat their own words. Their chosen policy of non-com- 
mittal on the Wilmot proviso, still led them to seek the ad- 
mission of California as a State. The northern democrats who 



* See Alta California of July 2, copied by the National Era of Aug. 16, 1849. 

+ Since the above paragraph was -written there have appeared strong indications 
of a desperate attempt to extend slavery into California, accompanied with partial 
success. We will still hope for the best, and that the Bafety of California will be 
secured in the liberation of the whole country. 



316 GEE AT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

had supported Gen. Cass, under the motto of " non-interven- 
tion," could make no show of self-consistencj r , could hold up 
no manly front, at the North, if they deserted California now. 
And those who had been elected under pledges to sustain the 
Wilmot proviso should be expected to be prompt in rendering 
this easier service. What pretext, indeed, could any Senator 
or Representative from a free state, devise, for not urging, ear- 
nestly, the admission of a, free State? The North, as being a 
majority, had the matter in their own hands. Add to all this, 
the slaveholding President himself, in his Message on the 
opening of the Session, (in December, 1849,) had mentioned 
the reception of California with favor, and the less violent and 
rabid of slaveholding statesmen, including two prominent 
leaders of the rival parties, Messrs. Benton and Clay, were 
understood to approve the President's course. An easy vic- 
tory should have been anticipated for the friends of Cali- 
fornia. 

Instead of this, the struggle was, perhaps, the most violent 
and long-protracted ever witnessed in our national councils. 
The extreme slave party, led on by Mr. Calhoun, demanded 
not only the rejection of California, but other concessions to 
the slave power, including an amendment of the Constitution 
that should equalize the political power of the free and slave 
states, as a condition of the continuance of the Union. The 
application of California for admission was repelled on the 
ground that she came without leave of Congress and under 
executive direction. The administration of President Taylor 
was arraigned for its activity in the measure, and intimations 
were made by Mr. Calhoun, that the policy might have had 
its origin under President Polk. Whether by Mr. Polk, Gen. 
Taylor, or Gen. Piley, it was unequivocally denounced. 

While this controversy was raging in Congress, New Mexi- 
co, from similar causes, and in imitation of the example of 
California, adopted a State Constitution, excluding slavery, 
and applied also for admission into the Union. 

The slaveholding State of Texas, alarmed by this move- 
ment, now urged her pretensions of a western boundary that 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 317 

should include a large portion of New Mexico, by whom this 
pretension was repelled, and Texas threatened a resort to 
arms. 

In this state of things a plan of so-called compromise was 
introduced into the Senate by a committee of thirteen, of 
which Mr. Clay was chairman, embracing the following par- 
ticulars, viz: 1. The future admission of new slave States, to 
be formed out of Texas. 2. The admission, forthwith, of 
California, with her proposed boundaries. JS. The establish- 
ment of territorial governments without the Wilmot proviso, 
for New Mexico and Utah. -i. The combination of the two 
last mentioned measures in one bill. 5. The establishment of 
the Western and Northern boundary of Texas excluding from 
her jurisdiction all of New Mexico, with a grant to Texas of 
a pecuniary equivalent. 6. More effectual enactments to se- 
cure the return of fugitive slaves, (as previously introduced in 
a bill by Mr. Mason of Virginia.) 7. The abolition of the 
slave trade, but not slavery, in the District of Columbia.* 

Mr. Clay's project of securing all these measures simultane- 
ously, by the adoption of this Report of the Committee, did 
not succeed. After a tedious and protracted effort, the plan 
was marred by amendments, till the Report, as a whole, was 
defeated and abandoned. A similar project was next attempt- 
ed by separate bills, and with the following results : 

1. The admission of California as a free State, with her 
proper boundaries. 

2. Territorial governments for New Mexico and Utah with- 
out excluding slavery, and with the provision that the States 
hereafter formed out of them shall be admitted into the Union 
either with or without slavery, as the Constitutions of the new 
States shall decide. 

3. The boundary of Texas is so fixed as to surrender to that 
slave State at least ninety thousand square miles of free soil, 
and yet the same bill creates a national debt of ten millions 

* See National Era of May 16, 1850. 



318 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

of dollars to buy off the notoriously fraudulent and unfounded 
claims of Texas to New Mexico.* 

4. The abolition of the slave trade, but not of slavery, in 
the District of Columbia. This does not prevent citizens of the 
Federal District from selling their slaves into any of the States. 
It only prevents traders from bringing slaves into the District 
for sale and transportation. 

5. An act, supplementary to the act of 1793, for facilitating 
the recapture of fugitive slaves. By this new act all the re- 
maining defenses of personal liberty, in the non-slaveholding 
States, are effectually broken down, and every man, black or 
white, (for the law makes no distinction,) holds his exemption 
from chattelhood, so far as legal protection is concerned, at 
the mercy of any Southern man who may choose to claim him 
as his slave, in connection with any one of a horde of govern- 
ment officials, to be appointed for the special purpose, who is 
authorized to surrender him, without jury trial, with no testi- 
mony but that of the claimant or his agent, while the testi- 
mony of the person claimed is not to be received. All citizens 
are commanded to assist in seizing and surrendering fugitives, 
and all persons are forbidden to harbor them or aid their es- 
cape, under penalty of one thousand dollars, with imprison- 
ment not exceeding six months, besides one thousand dollars 
to be recovered in a civil suit for damages, for each slave so 
aided or harbored.f 



* National Era, Sept. 12, 1850. 

t It will be seen that the substance of Mr. Clay's Compromise bill was reached by 
these separate enactments. According to Thomas II. Benton, Senator from Missouri, 
there was still another item in the Compromise, not included in the Report of the 
Committee of Thirteen, but the subject of a verbal understanding among the mem- 
bers. The cotton manufacturers of New England were to be propitiated by a high 
tariff. But after the Southern members had got all they could, and especially the 
Fugitive Slave Bill, they deserted their Eastern friends, and defeated the tariff in 
the House of Representatives. The following is from the National Era of Oct. 
3, 1850 : ■ 

" Mr. Benton is apt to be very pithy in colloquial comment. Conversing with a 
senatorial friend the other day, about the Compromise or Omnibus, in which he 
took so tender an interest, he remarked : ' Sir, there were four inside passengers in 
that Omnibus— there was California, sir ; there was New Mexico ; there was Texas ; 
there was Utah, 6ir !— four inside passengers. There was two outside passengers, 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 319 



CHAPTER XXVIII. 

FURTHER ACTION OF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT — GENERAL 
i POLICY AND POLITICAL ECONOMY CONTROLLED BY SLAVERY. 

Considerations and testimonies in point — Commercial prosperity of the North — The 

Embargo — Non-intercourse — Second Embargo — Destruction of the Old National 

Bank — Calhoun's War of 1812 with Great Britain — Treatment of New England — 

; Southern ascendency established — Rise of manufactures — Their wreck on return 

' of Peace — Revival of Northern Commerce — Calhoun's Protective Tariff of 1816 — 

; Southern call for a National Bank, and why? — Pecuniary embarrassments of 

I 1819-20— Southern bankruptcy of 1S24— Cotton Speculations of 1826 and 1837— 

■ Bankruptcy of U. S. Bank, and why ? — Its demise — Clamors of Calhoun against 

his own Tariff system — Nullification — Recapitulation — Note concerning State 

action. 

With the facts of the preceding history before us, it is very 
natural to inquire on what maxims, with what aims, and for 
what objects, the general policy of the Federal Government has 
been moulded, from the beginning to the present time. Not 
la single administration of that government have we found 
free from the controlling influence of slavery. Not only has 
slavery been steadily fostered as an important interest of the 
country, but as the paramount, the all-absorbing interest, be- 
fore whose claims every other interest and all other interests 
combined, have been forced to give way. 

We have, thus far, considered only the direct action of the 

sir: There was the fugacious Slave Bill, and the District Slave-trade Abolition Bill. 
'They could not be admitted inside, but they had outside seats, and the inside and 
'outside passengers could be seen and known, sir. But there was another passenger, 
under the driver's seat, sir ; carefully concealed in the boot, sir ; breathing through 
chinks and holes like Henry Box Brown, sir — the Tariff, sir ! But he had a worse 
fate than Box Brown — he was killed — killed in the House, sir — and I hope we shall 
have no more Omnibuses and no more passengers in the boot, 6ir !' " 



320 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

Federal Government, in manifest support of slavery. But the 
general policy and the political economy of the country could 
scarcely fail to have had the most important bearings either 
for or against the slave interest. Is it credible that this has 
been overlooked ? With the ever watchful eye that we know 
the slave power has had over its own interests, with all the 
successive administrations of the Government under its con- 
trol, and ready, as we have seen, to do its bidding, with slave- 
holding Presidents and Cabinets of their selection, forty-nine, 
years out of sixty-one, and while the support of slavery has 
been their constant care, can it be believed that the ever con- 
flicting and totally irreconcilable interests of free and slave la- 
bor have never been thought of, nor taken into consideration, 
in shaping our national policy? Or can it be supposed that 
the always dominant slave power, everywhere else true to its 
own rapacious instincts, has, just here, where the chess games 
of political economy are constantly played between the rival 
interests of the country, been inattentive, or neutral, or that 
it has held the balances between the slaveholding and non- 
slaveholding States, with an even and impartial hand ? No 
intelligent citizen can believe this. We might almost be cer- 
tain, therefore, in advance of all direct scrutiny of the facts of 
our history, that the general policy of the country has been 
moulded by the slave power, for the benefit of slavery, and in 
consequent hostility to the interests of free labor. The law 
of self-preservation would require this, especially as the inter- 
ests of slave labor are always destined to grapple with the 
inherent thriftlessness, imbecility and decline incident to the 
system, in striking contrast to the ever buoyant and recuper- 
ative energies of free labor. It would not be enough for the 
slave power, acting as a political economist, and mainly intent 
on retaining its political supremacy, to content itself with de- 
vices and expedients to prop up and encourage slave labor. 
It must do more than this. It must adroitly stab and cripple 
its rival. It must so shape and shift public measures as to 
disarrange, thwart, perplex, and unsettle the pursuits and the 
arrangements of free laborers, or else itself fall into inevitable 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 321 

eclipse, sustain certain defeat, and let go the sceptre of power. 
An illustration and proof of all this we have in the recent de- 
mand of the late Mr. Calhoun, that the Constitution should 
be so amended as to restore to the slave States the same rela- 
tive power that they had, at the first organization of the gov- 
ernment, and which we know they have lost, in despite of 
their political ascendancy, by the opposite tendencies of free- 
dom and slavery. In making that desperate demand, Air. 
Calhoun laid bare his own heart, and the settled policy of the 
oligarchy of slaveholders. The free North must be shorn of her 
oivn natural strength, when needful, that slavery may preserve Im- 
balance of power. With this simple key, the historian may 
unlock the otherwise inexplicable labyrinths of American 
politics, for the last sixty years. Thus instructed, he will be 
enabled to read into one straightforward and undeviatinp: 
chapter of national policy the fluctuations of eleven Presiden- 
tial administrations, amid all the idle clamor of rival aspirants, 
and the rise and fall of the contending factions that have al- 
ternately affected to be the Government. In all these apparent 
changes, the slave power has governed, and with one steady 
purpose, and never more steadily and effectively than in the 
midst of seeming change and caprice. 

If any one considers this a severe charge against the South, 
a southern witness shall be summoned to the stand. The tor- 
turing rack of party exigences and of personal rivalry, on 
one occasion, extorted the confession, on northern soil, from 
a statesman of the South. At a New York State Whig Con- 
vention in Utica, in 1839, Mr. Stanley, "the eloquent member 
of Congress, from North Carolina," declared that "John C. 
Calhoun introduced a certain measure (the sub-treasury bill) 
as a southern measure." " Mr. Calhoun" continued Mr. Stan- 
ley, " knew that it must break down northern manufactures and 
capital, and destroy the North. I conversed with Mr. Calhoun ; 
he expressed himself contemptuously of Mr. Van Buren ; he 
spoke of him only as a ' fly on the wheel.' It was not his 
measure, but our measure. We could retrieve all or destroy." 
It is in no spirit of sympathy with the whig party, and with 



322 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

no particular hostility to the sub-treasury bill, (on its own 
merits) that we record this disclosure of Mr. Stanley. What 
we would bring into notice is the fact that influential south- 
ern statesmen, of opposite political parties, are in the habit of 
commending to each other, in familiar conversation, their re- 
spective measures of natiorral policy, as being adapted to de- 
range northern capital, and perplex the arrangements and opera- 
tions of free labor. We shall see how effectually this has been 
done as we proceed. 

The clause of the Constitution directing the apportionment 
of "representatives and direct taxes," by the same complex 
and unequal estimate of inhabitants,* affords evidence that 
direct taxation was contemplated by the framers of that in- 
strument. It is not credible that the northern members would 
have consented to yield up their due share of representation, 
but for the prospect that the southern states, as being the 
gainers in that part of the bargain, would return an equiva- 
lent by paying the larger portion of the taxes. It was cha- 
racteristic of the North to stipulate for a pecuniary compensa- 
tion, as it was of the South to grasp after an undue share of 
political power. How rigorously the South has claimed and 
exercised her stipulated political power, has been exhibited 
already in part. In completing the picture, we shall show 
how, in the use of that political power the North has been 
defrauded of her stipulated pecuniary equivalent. One word 
tells this part of the story. No " direct taxes" or none of any 
importance, have ever been levied ! And the device by which 
the fulfilment of this constitutional compromise was evaded, 
furnishes a clue to the policy which has controlled the fiscal 
arrangements of the country ever since. 

It was among the first cares of the slaveholding oligarchy, 
after the organization of the Federal Government, and under 
its first administration, to evade the payment of any "direct 
taxes" into the treasury. Well knowing, that if a revenue 
could be derived from duties on merchandize imported, the 

* Art. I., See. 2, Clauses. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 323 

burden would fall mainly on the states that imported and con- 
sumed most of foreign merchandize, and that these would be 
the non-slaveholding states, a tariff sufficient for the purposes 
of revenue, yet ostensibly designed to favor the gradual 
growth of domestic manufactures, was thus early introduced ; 
and so far as the raising of revenue is concerned, has continued 
the settled policy of the country ever since. Amid all the 
fluctuations and controversies respecting the tariff, a sufficient 
impost for purposes of revenue has been conceded by all par- 
ties — controlled as all parties have been by slavery — till it 
almost seems to have been forgotten that a revenue can be 
raised in any other way, or that the power to levy "direct 
taxes" was ever vested in the government. This was the 
first triumph of slavery over the political economy of the 
■country, and is closely connected with all its triumphs since. 
By thus replenishing the National Treasury by a method of 
taxation, bearing chiefly on the free states, and from which 
the slave states are comparatively exempt, the Slave Power 
that wields the National Government has been supplied with 
an ample revenue with which to carry on its more direct 
operations in behalf of slavery — its purchase of new slave 
territory — its pro-slavery diplomacy — and its pro-slavery wars. 
"With only a revenue raised by " direct taxes" very little in 
these directions could have been realized. 

The present century opened with a remarkable state of 
things. Our country was at peace with all the world, and, 
with exception of a contest with the petty states of Barbary, 
we remained at peace, until the war with Britain, in 1812. 
Europe was embroiled in war. England, with some of the 
continental powers, contested the fearful strides of Napoleon. 
Every European nation was enlisted on one side or the other, 
and Europe became one vast encampment. Her agriculturists 
and artizans were under arms. Her commerce was swept 
from the sea by her own contending navies. Even Britain, 
'' lord of the ocean," was powerful only to destroy, but could 
not protect her own merchantmen. America, as the only 
neutral and maratime nation, reaped rich harvests. She was 



324 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

the carrier of all Christendom. She not only vended her own 
products at her own prices, but levied tribute at her pleasure, 
upon the produce of all nations, upon those of South Ameri- 
ca, the Caribbean Islands, Eastern India, and China. Not a 
chest of tea, not a bale of nankins, not a bag of coffee, not a 
barrel of flour, not a bale of cotton, at treble their present 
prices, could purchase the insurer's passport to cross the ocean, 
unless covered by the stripes and stars of the North American 
States. "Within less than two hundred years after the landing 
at Plymouth was this wonderful phenomenon witnessed ; and 
by the sons of the pilgrims, chiefly, was this immense contri- 
bution gathered. In the counting-houses of New England 
and New York, were seated the merchant princes, more po- 
tent and more comprehensive in their sway than those of 
ancient Tyre, by whom this vast tribute was levied. 

But where was the sunny South at this period. Did she 
thrust in her sickle, and gather golden harvests, when the 
earth was reaped? Where were her gallant ships? Her 
princely merchants — -where ? The South had no foreign com- 
merce. The cheerful music of the caulker, the rigger, and 
the sailor, mingle not with the sound of the driver's lash. 
The spoiled sons of effeminacy, lawlessness and sloth, the 
heroes of the whip and the bowie-knife, are not merchants. 
The traffickers in women and babes excel not in lawful com- 
merce. The land of slavery did not prosper. The curse of 
omnipresent justice, interwoven into the slave system itself, 
was gnawing at her vitals. She turned her eye of anguish 
and envy at the free and prospering North, inquiring within 
herself how she could preserve her balance of power. 

The Slave Power, like the power of the pit, never lacks for 
a stratagem. The Slave Power ruled in the Cabinet, and stood 
behind the Presidential Chair. I sin not against the demo- 
cracy of Mr. Jefferson. His democracy, however correct in 
theory, was here, as on his plantation, held in abeyance, and 
cherished "in the abstract." There was nothing of Mr. Jef- 
ferson's democracy in his slaveholding : and there was nothing 
of it in the embargo. That measure, dictated probably against 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 325 

his wishes by the Slave Power,* was levelled at the commer- 
cial prosperity of the free North. Democracy, as expounded 
by Mr. Jefferson, was jealous of Federal encroachment, and 
watchful of State rights. The embargo was the utmost stretch 
of Federal encroachment, in open contempt of the wishes of 
the commercial States. Democracy was the guardian of " free 
trade," the boasted champion (before and after the embargo) 
of "sailors' rights." The embargo annihilated commerce, 
and thus prohibited the avocation of the sailor! Democracy 
had claimed, through Mr. Jefferson, " the equal rights of 
every citizen in his person and property, and their manage- 
ment," The embargo singled out a most important class of 
citizens, while in the act of adding, beyond any ancient or 
modern precedent, to the wealth of their nation, wrested " the 
management of their property" out of their hands, prohibited 
their lawful and honorable business, and condemned their 
property — their shipping,, richly laden with their country's 
produce — to rot at their own wharves. 

And what was the pretext for the embargo? The rival 
edicts and contending fleets of France and England had 
perpetrated some depredations on our commerce, for which 
we had obtained no redress or security, to the possible amount 
of five or ten per cent, of the nett profits of our commerce, 
after paying a high insurance. Did our merchants, the direct 
sufferers under these depredations, desire the protection of 
an embargo ? Not they ! With all their united influence of 
petition, remonstrance, and suffrage, they protested against it. 
They even contested the constitutionality of the embargo in 
the Federal courts. They pleaded that the power " to regu- 
late commerce" was not a power to annihilate it.f The 



* It was commonly understood at the time, that the embargo policy did not 
originate with Mr. Jefferson, but was urged upon him by the extreme South. 
This was the apology of his partisans in the Northern and Eastern States. 

t The petitions to Congress to abolish the interstate slave trade, under this same 
clause of the Constitution, have been successfully parried by this plea, which did not 
suffice for the Northern merchants. Our constitutional expounders would have us 
believe that Congress has power to annihilate all commerce except the traffic in slaves ! 
Is it not time to distrust such expositors ? 



326 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

defense of the Government was, not that commerce was not 
annihilated (for not a coasting packet might navigate Long 
Island Sound !) but that the power to regulate commerce did 
involve the power of its annihilation. And the Federal Courts 
sustained the Federal Administration. Thus Northern com- 
merce was destroyed, to protect it from petty depredations ! 
As a measure of retaliation or coercion against France and 
England, the embargo could never have been supposed to be 
of any value. 

The theory of political economy then in vogue at the South, 
adopted by the administration party, and promulgated through 
all its presses, bears testimony that the protection of Northern 
commerce from European depredation was not (as it could not 
have been) the object of the embargo. The theory was that 
commerce is corrupting — that the spirit of commerce is the 
spirit of cupidity and subversive of the spirit of freedom — 
that " great commercial cities are great sores" upon the body 
politic — that the concentration of capital is dangerous in a 
republic — that independency of foreign nations requires us to 
be agriculturists and manufacturers, not merchants — and 
that, like the Chinese, we should stay at home, and let foreign 
nations who want our products come after them. By this 
teaching, a jealousy against merchants and commerce was 
fostered, even among the yeomanry and mechanics of the 
North. Whatever of plausibility or mixture of truth there 
may have been in this philosophy, its propagation by the 
slaveholders at this juncture throws light upon their policy, 
and confirms the conclusion that the embargo and non-inter- 
course policy was designed to cripple and destroy, instead of 
protecting and fostering, Northern commerce. Nor can we 
overlook the coincidence by which this visitation was inflicted 
upon the North, almost simultaneously with the abolition of 
the African slave trade, and the explosion and defeat of the 
great South-Western Conspiracy under Aaron Burr, by the 
disclosures of a citizen of New England. The embargo was 
laid in December, 1807, and was continued till March, 1809, 
when it was exchanged for an act of non-intercourse with 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 327 

England and France. In this policy the administration was 
unexpectedly sustained by an influential statesman of the 
North, the distinguished senator from Massachusetts,* who 
prefaced his vote with this remarkable argument — " The Presi- 
dent has recommended it. I would not deliberate : — I would 
act." He was soon after named Minister to Russia, and was 
almost constantly in Executive employ, till, having been made 
Secretary of State under Mr. Monroe (equivalent then to 
nomination as his successor), he came into the Presidency in 
1825, with the aid of Mr. Clay, whom he appointed Secretary 
of State, and with whom he administered the Government in 
the manner already shown. From the date of that appoint- 
ment to Russia it has been evident that Presidential patron- 
age, the gift of the slaveholders, is an over-match for any 
hold the free States may have upon the most gifted of their 
sons. 

The non-intercourse with France was terminated in 1810. 
That with Great Britain was continued, including a second 
embargo of two months, till the declaration of war by Con- 
gress against that country, in June, 1812. From the begin- 
ning of the first embargo, therefore, in Dec, 1807, until the 
peace of Dec, 1814 (not available to the ship-owners until the 
opening of navigation in the spring of 1815), the commerce 
of the free States was either totally prohibited, or rendered 
of little pecuniary value. A general conflagration among the 
warehouses and shipping of the free States — all things con- 
sidered — would scarcely have inflicted so great a calamity, 
could the merchants have been then left at liberty to repair 
their losses by resuming their business. 

In 1811, the charter of the old National Bank expired, and 



* John Quincy Adams. We are not at liberty to suppress so instructive an incident 
in the history of this great man and of the country. The remarkable independence 
and signal services of Mr. Adams, in the House of Representatives, after having been 
ejected from the Presidency to make room for a slaveholder, will always be regarded 
the brightest portion of his political life. A similar destiny may be claimed, per- 
haps, to have had a similar effect upon Mr. Van Buren — a lesson to be pondered by 
those who shall succeed them. 



328 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

was not permitted by the dominant slave power to be renewed, 
on the alleged ground that a national bank was unconstitu- 
tional, a consideration not discovered when it was chartered. 
The real reason was that the South had become bankrupt, as 
it periodically does, as often generally as once in ten or fifteen 
years, throwing off the greater part of its indebtedness upon 
its creditors in some other community. No country cultiva- 
ted by slave labor does otherwise. The British West Indies, 
under the slave system, was always a burthen to the merchants 
and bankers of England, in the long run, however profitable 
their custom might appear to be for a season. The slave sys- 
tem never supports itself for any great length of time in con- 
tinuation. The periodical collapse must inevitably come. In 
old colonial times, the creditors of the South were chiefly in 
England, and the South went into the Revolution of 1776 (in 
despite of her inherent and prevalent toryism) for the purpose, 
mainly, of wiping out the old score. But since the revolu- 
tion, the northern cities of New York, Philadelphia and Bos- 
ton have shared largely in the honors and emoluments of 
southern custom. The result came upon them in company 
with other calamities, in 1811. But along with the embargo 
and non-intercourse, it greatly assisted the South to regain, 
in a pecuniary view, her endangered balance of power. Al- 
most the sum total of her indebtedness to the North was now 
to be dexterously shifted from one scale to the other, with 
the double effect of relieving the South of the same weight 
that was to be thrown upon the North. In many ways the 
demise of the National Bank was exceedingly opportune to 
them at this juncture. The South had got out of the bank 
in the shape of loans, all it could, and southern securities 
were now in bad odor with the directors, while northern pa- 
per was discounted freely, and the bank was a financial assist- 
ant of the northern merchants. More than this. The Bank 
was the agent employed by the North to collect her debts at 
the South. What could the South now want of the bank? 
A National Bank was unconstitutional of course, and had 
leave to be interred. In mourning over the loss of their bank, 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 329 

and the depredations of the non-intercourse and embargo, 
the attention of the northern merchants would be diverted, 
in a measure, from the direct losses they sustained from the 
indebtedness of the South. The greater the smoke and the 
more scattered the fires, the better chance for pillage, and the 
less fear of detection. 

Calamities seldom come singly, and crime is the precursor 
of crime. The slave power now demanded a war. Unhap- 
pily a pretext was at hand. The British "Orders in Council" 
of Nov., 1807, prohibiting all neutral trade with France and 
her allies, were still in force, though there was a prospect that 
they would soon be repealed. Deserters from the British 
navj r , who had found a more lucrative and pleasant employ 
on board American vessels, both national and mercantile, 
had been not unfrequently demanded and reclaimed by the 
British commanders. On one occasion, the demand had been 
refused, but enforced. The British ship of war Leopard had 
fired into the American frigate Chesapeake, killed three men, 
and wounded eighteen, after which the seamen claimed were 
given up. On investigation, it appeared that three of them 
were American citizens. This event, which took place in 
June, 1807, had greatly excited the American people at the 
time, and the impressment of seamen was still a subject of 
complaint, though the number of actual impressments was 
afterwards admitted to have been far less than was believed 
and represented at first, as very few American seamen were 
finally found missing from our ports. By far the greater por- 
tion of alleged impressments were cases of the recovery of 
British seamen, who, from similarity of appearance and lan- 
guage, had succeeded in procuring American " protections " 
or passports. It was notorious that many thousands of British 
seamen were thus certified to be Americans. This matter 
tvas coming to be understood. Aside, therefore, from the 
British Orders in Council, this country could not have been 
dragooned into a war with that nation. Nor was it done at 
all, without the earnest remonstrance of the maratime and 
commercial classes, and indeed almost all the people of New 



330 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

England, who were the chief sufferers both from impressment 
and the " Orders in Council." The South undertook, very 
kindly, the protection of the North. "Free trade and sailors' 
rights " was now the southern watchword : — that same " free 
trade " that had been so long denounced by the South as the 
bane of the republic, a national curse, and proscribed by non- 
intercourse and embargo ! Those same " sailors' rights " 
that had been so recently cloven down and annihilated by 
the same arbitrary measures ! The pretense of the southern 
enemies of commerce, of caring for the " free trade and 
sailors' rights" of the commercial and hated North, was too 
flimsy to be plausible. To a great extent the thin disguise 
was soon thrown off, and southern editors and orators ful- 
minated, in the same paragraphs, their anathemas against 
New England and Old England, avowing the determination 
to chastise and humble them both, at the same time, and by 
the same blow. 

The war party was led on by John C. Calhoun, of South 
Carolina, who claimed the paternity of the measure, and drove 
it furiously through both houses of Congress.* Mr. Clay was 

* Mr. Madison, then President, recommended the war in a message to Congress, 
but his proverbial timidity and caution forbid the idea that he was the author of the 
measure. Mr. Calhoun, as the leader of the extreme Southern party, was commonly 
regarded as the real instigator of the war message, and his success in carrying the 
measure, gave him that decided and controlling influence over the national councils, 
which he ever afterwards retained, and nnder all the successive administrations of 
the government, till the day of his death, a period of thirty-eight years, during 
which time he seldom failed of eifecting the real, if not the ostensible, objects of his 
occult evolutions, which were little understood. Though charged with fickleness, 
he never swerved from his one original and single aim— the aggrandizement of the 
South by the discomfiture of the North. He was never more successful than in the 
moment of complaining loudly of defeat, and appearing to submit, reluctantly, to a 
compromise. Even the great compromiser, Mr. Clay, appeared to be but an imple- 
ment in his hands. He was charged with ambition for the Presidency, but in reality 
he preferred to govern through eight administrations (and he managed for the 
most part to do so), rather than rule through the brief period of one. He had the 
faculty of governing, through their hopes or their fears, the political party from 
which he seemed to stand aloof, as effectually as he did the party to which, for the 
time being, he seemed to belong. The *S7</!V party was the only party to which he 
ever really adhered. The skill with which he concocted a new party, by an alli- 
ance of the Southern " milliners," of whom he had been the leader, with the 
National Republicans of the North, against whom he had threatened a civil war, yet 






SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 331 

also in favor of the measure. At one stage of the proceed- 
ings, early in June, 1812, a motion was made in the Senate 
to postpone the declaration of war till the opening of the 
next session of Congress in December, when the policy of the 
British Government would be developed.* On this question 
the Senate was understood to be nearly equally divided, and 
Mr. Calhoun, whose influence was potential in both Houses, 
exerted himself to defeat the motion. Then it was that, 
after an adjournment, a large number of northern members, 
including prominent supporters of the administration, were 
said to have surrounded Mr. Calhoun in the lobby, imploring 
him to relent, and allow the country a respite till December. 
Mr. Calhoun was inexorable, and by extraordinary applian- 
ces, one or two members were gained over to his party, and 
the postponement was defeated in the Senate by a majority of one 
vote. This decided the question of war, which was declared 
by a vote of 79 to 49 in the House of Kepresentatives, and 
of 19 to 13 in the Senate. In a few weeks, news arrived, as 
was expected, of the repeal of the British Orders in Council, 
thus removing the chief cause of the war. But the object of 
the Calhoun party was gained. The nation was plunged into 
a war, in the midst of the pecuniary embarrassments arising 
from a general southern bankruptcy, (the North being the 
creditor) and from the sudden demise of the National Bank. 
New England, at such a crisis, more than Old England, would 
be the sufferer by the war, and the North would be burdened 
with the chief expense -of the infliction. 

The result of the measure, and especially the manner in 

stepping out of Iris new party before lie was fairly seated in it, was mistaken for 
caprice by those who saw not his object. It enabled him to be either Whig or 
Democrat, as he pleased, to stand with one foot in each scale, to make either side 
preponderate as ho chose, and become Secretary of State when he wished, by the 
acclamations of a Senate whose party was, even then, denouncing him ! Whoever 
would understand American politics from 1812 to 1850, must study the political his- 
tory of John C. Calhoun. 

* A motion was also made in the House of Representatives to include France in 
the measure, but the motion failed. The French had no naval force to spare for 
the coast of America, and could do little for the threatened chastisement of New 
England. 



832 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

which the war was conducted and terminated, were such as 
to justify, fully, this account of its object and its origin. Two 
commanders, in sympathy with the administration, Generals 
Hull and Smythe, the latter a Virginian, were sent, succes- 
sively, on expeditions of pretended invasion of Canada, but 
in both instances, the enterprise was abandoned when the 
Canadas were apparently in their power. General Hull sur- 
rendered to the British, to their great astonishment. The 
whole country accused him of treason, a court-martial sen- 
tenced him to death, but he was pardoned by the President.* 
General Smythe " suddenly retreated, to the great surprise of 
his troops." These facts, together with the systematic and 
even skillful withholding of supplies from the forces under 
other commanders, afterwards,! made it perfectly evident that 
the administration not only never intended the conquest of 
Canada, but took special care that no such acquisition of ter- 
ritory should add to the number of non-slaveholding States. 
Had Canada been adjacent to the slave States, and adapted to 
slave culture, there can be no reasonable doubt that it could 
have been conquered as expeditiously as were California and 
New Mexico. 

New England, in the mean time, though compelled to fur- 
nish largely to the sinews of a war waged, in reality, against 
herself — New England, in whose cities was the wealth that 
tempted the enemy, and in whose ports was the shipping that 
was endangered — New England, whose militia were subjected 
to drafts for enacting sham invasions of Canada, or massacres 
of the Indians, and whose seamen were winning victories on 
the western and northern lakes, and on the Atlantic — New 
England was systematically left defenseless, while her seaports 

* A defense of Geo. Hull was, many years afterwards, published, in which it was 
claimed that he surrendered for want of supplies, and that his course was in accord- 
ance with the secret intentions of the Government that so readily pardoned him. 

t As a specimen of these tactics, we notice that Virginian corn was sent in wagons 
to the forces on the Canada frontier, of which only one bushel to each wagon load 
was delivered to the army, the balance being consumed by the teams on the journey 
out and home ; while large supplies of northern corn might have been purchased 
near at hand. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 333 

were blockaded, a vast amount of her shipping destroyed, her 
eastern borders exposed to hostile incursions, and the port of 
Castine held in possession of the enemy for many months. 
When, under these circumstances, and after all remonstrances 
had proved unavailing, New England statesmen were found 
who demanded that New England resources and New Eng- 
land militia should be retained , by the State authorities for 
home defense, the cry of treason was raised against them, 
which has been continued to the present day." 

The threat of humbling New England was thus signally 
fulfilled. New England cowered under the lash of the slave- 
driver, and has never since adventured to lift up her head in 
the national councils. Her most gifted Representatives and 
Senators find ample scope for their powers in bowing to the 
behests of slavery, or only make a brief bluster of resistance, 
to quail the lower at last, or be deserted by their cotton lords 
at home. 

When the war had accomplished its grand objects, when 
the bankrupt Slave States had regained and more than re- 
gained their balance of power with the North by despoiling it 
of half its remaining wealth, after the previous inflictions of 
non-intercourse and embargo, when Old England had been 
successfully employed to chastise and humble New England, 
when insult had been added to injury, and the loss of honor 
and reputation conjoined with the loss of wealth and political 
influence, the slave power was ready to restore peace. And 
this was done without a single lisp of " free trade and sailors' 
rights." Neither the treaty, nor the negotiations, nor the in- 
structions from the Cabinet underwhich they were conducted, 



* The claims of Massachusetts on the Federal Government, for the services of 
her militia under the State authority, in defending her own coasts, at a time when 
the Federal Government persisted in leaving them absolutely defenseless, was after- 
wards contemptuously and insultingly disallowed, and the very act of this self- 
defense is still pointed at as evidence of " constructive treason !" And thus the 
State contributing most largely (in proportion to population and territory) to the 
Federal expenses during the war, was compelled to defend itself by additional exer- 
tions, at its own cost, and be branded with the taint of treason to boot ! Is it a 
marvel that the politicians of Massachusetts became servile ? 



334 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

contained the slightest allusion to the ostensible grounds of 
the war, or provided or sought the least semblance of any 
security against similar aggressions in future. Thus ended a 
war of nearly three years, conducted at an expense of nearly 
thirty millions per annum, chiefly paid by the free States, the 
price of their own subjugation and disgrace — a war whose 
"glory " has given us two Presidents, one of them a slave- 
holder, the other a native Virginian, and a steady supporter 
of the slave power — a war that virtually enthroned, from 1812 
to 185*0, the bitter enemy of northern as -well as southern lib- 
erty, John C. Calhoun.* 

Free labor, ever buoyant and recuperative, had, however, 
survived. The hardy yeomanry of the North had earned 
their own bread with their own hands, had paid all the de- 
mands of an oppressive government, and aided by the high 
war prices of their products, while consuming as little as pos- 
sible of foreign merchandise, had thriftily maintained their 
ground. The remnant of surplus capital, in the cities, driven 
from its own field of enterprise, and encouraged by the scarcity 
of foreign fabrics, had invested itself in the manufacture of 



* The writer is aware that his account of the embargo, non-intercourse, and war 
of 1812, will be as distasteful to some of the partisans and admirers of Jefferson 
and Madison, as his account of Washington's administration and the Federal party 
will be to some of their political opponents. But history should be impartial; and 
a writer who has religiously stood aloof from both parties may claim to have seen 
passing events with his own eyes, and may be permitted to record them as he has 
apprehended them. In use of the same liberty, he may further say here, once for 
all, that since the war of 1812, as before, he has found no essential difference, on tho 
whole, between the two parties. The so called Republican or Democratic party, 
afraid of an aristocracy of Northern capital, has thrown itself into the arms of the 
slaveholders. The Federal, National Republican, and Whig parties, while they have 
been this, have also had their slaveholding allies, whose aid they could not afford to 
spare, and hence the slave question has never been made an issue by those parties. 
When in power they have been as servile as their rival. Neither of them have been 
anti-slavery parties at any period, nor otherwise (at bottom) than aristocratic parties, 
being all of them governed by one or the other of the rival aristocracies, Northern 
or Southern. A truly democratic party has never yet come into power. The people 
have been cheated by professions and names. Since the rise of the Cotton power 
at the North, allied to the Cotton power of the South, the rival aristocracies have 
been merged in one, and the two political parties are kept up as mere shams, to pre- 
vent a united rally of the people against the now united aristocracy of the country, 
represented by " compromise" legislation and " Union Committees." 






SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 335 

cotton and woollen cloths, of a coarse but substantial texture. 
But the return of peace brought an influx of foreign goods, 
and a sudden reduction of prices, ruinous to manufacturers as 
well as merchants. Years were required to repair these fresh 
depredations, and the new policy of free commerce, it was 
thought, precluded the prospect that our infant manufactures 
could be sustained. No " protective tariff" came to their aid, 
then. The South, no longer fearing the seductive influences 
of commerce, had become the champion of " free trade." The 
North, by this time, understood her position too well to bring 
forward any measures of her own. Manufactures were, for 
the most part, abandoned, the manufacturing villages were 
deserted, and where absolute bankruptcy did not prevent, the 
little remnant of capital was invested in foreign commerce. 
The merchant who had been compelled by southern policy to 
turn manufacturer during the embargo, the non-intercourse, 
the second embargo, and the war, while his shipping was 
either rotting at his wharf, or had fallen into the hands of the 
British, was now compelled by the new southern policy to let 
his factory and village fall to decay, rebuild again his ships, 
and commence merchant again. In a short time, the settled 
channel of northern capital and enterprise was again foreign 
commerce; and a brisk business in that line was again bring- 
ing in an influx of wealth. 

No sooner was this witnessed or anticipated, than another 
change' came over the political economists of the South. 
"Free trade" became a political heresy, and the doctrine of 
the Jeffersonian period, condemnatory of foreign commerce, 
and in favor of domestic manufactures, was suddenly revived. 
The South wanted an increasing northern market for her cot- 
ton, and northern capital must be forced to become a customer. 
The South wanted, likewise, a duty on raw foreign cottons 
that should exclude those imported from South America. 
The South wanted, more than all, another opportunity to dis- 
arrange and perplex her pecuniary rival, the free laboring 
North. Not the slightest objection was it, in her eye, that 
some hundred millions of northern capital, as our northern 



336 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

statesmen demonstrated, would have to be sacrificed by the 
change. The high tariff of 1816 was forced upon the reluc- 
tant North by the same John C. Calhoun who had dictated 
the war of 1812. Northern capitalists demurred. They de- 
sired no capricious change. The merchants had rebuilt their 
ships, and wished for no interference with their " free trade." 
Of the few remaining manufacturers, some were also merchants, 
and nearly all of them, with singular unanimity, repudiated 
the policy of an artificial hot-bed growth of manufactures, 
predicting, sagaciously, the over production, the reaction, and 
the fluctuations afterwards realized by such violations of the 
law of supply and demand. But the North was overruled. 
Calhoun again triumphed. The Calcutta trade was annihila- 
ted, and our commerce with France and England reduced and 
shorn of its rich profits, in obedience to the new policy. Fac- 
tory villages sprung up again like mushrooms. Thousands 
embarked in the new business. Over competition and over 
production ruined or crippled a large portion of them in four 
or five years, and instability and uncertainty became inscribed, 
legibly, upon their edifices and their fabrics. For the dozens 
who succeeded and amassed wealth, there were to be reckoned 
hundreds, if not thousands, who were driven into penury and 
oblivion. 

The same memorable era, 1816, was marked by the estab- 
lishment of a second National Bank, and by the same Slave 
Power that had dictated the two embargoes, the non-inter- 
course, the war, and the tariff. It was dictated by the same 
policy and to subserve the same end — the preservation of the 
balance of power between free and slave labor, or rather, the 
ascendency of the latter over the former. A National Bank 
was deemed unconstitutional in 1811, but it became constitu- 
tional in 1816, for the South, after all her depredations upon 
the North, now condescended to become a borrower of north- 
ern capital ! Mr. Madison, in particular, whose constitutional 
scruples were insuperable, in 1811, overcame them in 1816, 
and not long afterwards became, it was said, a borrower from 
the National Bank of a large sum. Other slaveholding states- 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 337 

men conferred upon the bank the same honor. But it cost the 
northern banks and the northern capitalists and merchants a 
severe money pressure of three or four years to spare sulii- 
cient specie to get the new National Bank under way. So 
that the pecuniary embarrassment of 1819-20, arising from a 
reaction of the high tariff policy, was increased by the pro- 
cess of re-establishing a National Bank, and both burthens 
fell at the same time upon the free laboring North. The 
general southern bankruptcy of 182-1, renewed and aggra- 
vated by the southern cotton speculation of 1826, (an infa- 
mous process of gambling) trode rapidly upon the heels of 
the former inflictions of the Slave Power. An extensive, not 
to say general, bankruptcy visited Boston in 1824, and New 
York in 1826, from these joint causes, but chiefly from the 
accumulation of southern debts to the estimated amount of 
upwards of one hundred millions of dollars, of which, (as 
afterwards, in 1837,) scarcely five cents on the dollar were 
ever realized. 

Precisely at what date the second United States Bank was 
effectually pillaged and reduced to bankruptcy by its slave- 
holding customers, is not certainly known, but it must have 
been at a very early period, probably in 1823, soon after its 
specie capital had been supplied, and chiefly by the over-con- 
fiding North. Its . condition was for many years concealed, 
perhaps in the vain hope of retrieving its fortunes. At one 
time, it is said, the directors, having decided on making no 
more loans to the bankrupt South, adopted the policy of in- 
cluding the solvent North under the same restriction, lest 
offense should be taken at the invidious distinction, or the 
fact of southern delinquency at the bank be disclosed. Be 
this as it may, it proved to have been a rotten concern for 
years, while the public supposed it solvent. The Federal 
Government, as appointing a portion of the directors, comes 
in for a large share in the blame of this shameful mis-manage- 
ment. The bank was in the hands of demagogues, a tool of 
political corruption, and chiefly for the pecuniary and politi- 
cal emolument of the South at the expense and for the man- 



338 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

agement and subjugation of the North, purchasing editors if 
not Senators by its loans. Like its predecessors, it was first 
robbed and then buried, and all through the action of the 
Federal Government, at the dictation of the Slave Power. A 
renewal of its charter was refused in 1832, a fortunate event, 
as it proved, though its insolvency was not suspected then. 
It expired by limitation of charter in 1836. 

Free labor overcoming all its obstructions, contrived at 
length to flourish under the tariff system. The manufac- 
turing capitalists became first reconciled and then wedded to 
the policy. Thriving under it, they sought no essential 
change. But northern labor had long been held incompetent 
to self-direction, and had been accustomed to watch the mo- 
tions of the slave-driver. It adventured, however, a slight 
modification of the tariff in 1832, yet not departing from the 
principle and the policy upon which the system was founded, 
in 1816, by Mr. Calhoun. This temerity was made the pre- 
text for demanding a revolution in the policy of the country. 
The principle of a protective tariff became unpopular at the 
South as soon as it was perceived that the free labor of the 
North was thriving under it, and the growth of this dissatis- 
faction was well nigh simultaneous with the desire to inter 
the second National Bank. The policy of protection first 
fastened upon the country by Mr. Calhoun, was now dis- 
covered by Mr. Calhoun and his party to be an infraction of 
the constitution, oppressive to the South, the climax of politi- 
cal injustice, and demanding a dissolution of the Union, un- 
less speedily laid aside. After stretching the exercise of the 
powers of the Federal Government to the highest degree, by 
embargoes, war, tariff, and National Bank, the South now 
hoisted again the flag of "State Rights." A State Conven- 
tion of South Carolina, under the influence of Mr. Calhoun, 
declared the tariff acts unconstitutional, null and void, that 
duties should not be paid, and that if the General Govern- 
ment attempted to enforce the claim, the state would with- 
draw from the Union. President Jackson could do no less 
than repel this demand, but through the intervention of Mr. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 339 

Clay, a former champion of the protective policy, a compro- 
mise was made, by which the duties were gradually reduced 
till 1843, when they were to sink to the general level of 20 
per cent., which was accounted the revenue standard. In 
recent debates in the Senate concerning the Mexican war, 
Mr. Webster of Massachusetts, representing the cotton manu- 
facturers of that state, reminded southern Senators that the 
expenses of such a war would require an additional tariff. At 
this there was no demur, — not even from Mr. Calhoun ; and 
it is understood that the prospect of a high tariff reconciled 
the manufacturing capitalists of New England to that iniqui- 
tous war. 

Thus Slavery controls all the leading measures of the na- 
tion and moulds its political economy, — quite as remarkable 
for its real and inflexible constancy as for its apparently ca- 
pricious change. A comparison of dates, as before hinted, 
will show how exactly all these changes have corresponded 
and chimed in with the more direct and palpable action of 
the Federal Government in support* of slavery. Whenever 
such direct action, by the Government or by combinations, has 
been suspended, a more active control and a more rapid 
change of general measures has supplied the deficiency. And 
when the general policy of the country has been for any length 
of time undisturbed, it has been because more direct measures 
in support of slavery have been in progress. Thus, from 1807, 
on the explosion of the Southern and Western Conspiracy, 
till the first armed invasion of Texas, in 1819, the slave in- 
terest was sufficiently promoted by embargoes, non-intercourse, 
war, tariff, the destruction of the first National Bank, and the 
establishment of the second. ' So, likewise, from 1836 to 1850, 
while so much direct action in favor of slavery has been wit- 
nessed, the questions of tariffs and banks have been left com- 
paratively undisturbed. 

With equal skill and tact has the slave power contrived to 
keep up two political parties, extending through the North 
and the South, on the most fallacious and deceptive issues, or 
upon scarcely any issue at all. By this means she diverts atten- 



340 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

tion from the real to the merely nominal issues before the 
country, while by controlling both parties, she secures her 
ends through the ascendency of either, makes the one a check 
upon the other, and manages them through fear or through 
hope. 

THE STATE GOVERNMENTS. 

This chapter on the action of the Federal Government in support of 
slavery, might be appropriately followed by an account of the action of the 
State Governments, even at the North, in a similar direction. Our limits 
forbid us to enter into these details. Suffice it to say that most of the free 
States are disgraced by constitutional or legislative provisions discriminating, 
invidiously, between white and colored citizens, and depriving the latter of 
their equal rights of suffrage and eligibility to office. Colored citizens of 
the free States, employed on board ships visiting the South, are subject to 
seizure and imprisonment, in violation of their constitutional rights. An 
effort was made by Massachusetts to obtain a legal redress of these grie- 
vances in the courts of South Carolina and Louisiana. But her Commis- 
sioners, Messrs. Hoare and Hubbard, were ejected from Charleston and 
New Orleans under threats of violence, and Massachusetts submits to the 
insult. In Ohio there were laws enacted designed to prevent the settlement 
of colored citizens in that State. In Connecticut a law was passed pro- 
hibiting schools for teaching colored pupils. But these laws of Ohio and 
Connecticut have been repealed. Both the enactment and the repeal of 
these two laws — it may be proper to say — took place during the present 
agitation of the slave question by abolitionists. 

We have carefully confined ourselves in these chapters (as in the preceding 
ones concerning " the Position of the Churches ") to the course that has 
been pursued in respect to slavery, disconnected from any controversies 
about the measures of "modern abolitionists," or statements concerning the 
opposition raised against them. And we deem it no vain repetition to pro- 
pound again, here, the inquiry — Is it credible that those who hold such a 
position in respect to slavery could have been otherwise than annoyed and 
offended by any earnest efforts for its* immediate and unconditional aboli- 
tion? 

Some further light on this question may be afforded in our next chapter, 
exhibiting a movement in which the prominent actors, in political and 
ecclesiastical life, combined their forces and commingled their labors. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 841 



CHAPTER XXIX. 

COLONIZATION SOCIETY. 

Originated with Slaveholders — Object — Discourages emancipation, yet professes to 
favor it — Violates its own Constitution, by denying to the people of color their 
rights of citizenship — Justifies Slavery — Condemns emancipation — Slanders the 
people of color — Justifies oppression — Declares prejudice against color invincible 
— Pledged, in advance, to oppose Abolition Societies — The representatives of the 
leading political and ecclesiastical influences of the country — Its leaders in sympa- 
thy with the Fugitive Slave Bill— Meeting at Boston — False pretenses of checking 
the African slave trade and evangelizing Africa. 

The American Colonization Society, with its auxiliaries, is 
sustained by the leading influences in the Church and in the 
State. The position of these, in respect to American Slavery, 
has already been shown. It would be strange if the Society 
should differ widely from the course and policy of those who 
originated it, and who give shape to its measures. Its two- 
fold character of ecclesiastical and political gives it a wide 
range. It takes its place in the list of our religious anniver- 
saries, is advocated in the pulpit on the Sabbath, is claimed to 
be a missionary institution, asks patronage and accepts the 
widow's mite as a benevolent enterprise ; yet it proposes to 
build up an empire in Africa ; for many years it superintended 
a colonial government in Liberia ;* has received indirect aid 
from Congress, and large funds from State legislatures. Its 
friends give a two-fold account of its origin. Sometimes they 
say it was devised and planned by Rev. Samuel J. Mills, a 
young minister earnestly intent on evangelizing Africa. Some- 

* The Colony has at length become independent of the Society, yet the Society 
continues, in other respects, its operations. 



342 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

times they commend it as having originated in the political 
sagacity of popular statesmen, Mr. Jefferson, Mr. Clay, Mr. 
Mercer, and Mr. Madison, not remarkable, all of them, for 
evangelizing enterprise. The authentic account appears to be 
as follows : 

1. Origin. — The entire movement grew out of an alarm 
caused by an attempted slave insurrection. Hence the effort 
of the Virginia Legislature to induce Congress to colonize free 
blacks.' This measure failing, a society for the purpose was 
formed. 

In December, 1816, the Legislature of Virginia passed a 
resolution requesting the Governor to correspond with the 
President of the United States, for the purpose of obtaining 
territory in Africa or elsewhere for colonizing free people 
of color and those who might afterwards become free. 

A few days afterwards a meeting was held in Washington 
City composed of southern gentlemen, at which Judge Wash- 
ington, a slaveholder and slave-vender, presided, and Henry 
Clay and Mr. Randolph, slaveholders, made speeches. The 
result was the organization of the American Colonization 
Society. Judge Washington was chosen President. Seven- 
teen Vice-Presidents were chosen, twelve of whom were in 
the slave states, and probably slaveholders. The twelve man- 
agers were also slaveholders. 

2. Object. — " The object to which its attention is to be 
exclusively directed, is to promote and execute a plan for col- 
onizing, (with their consent) the free people of color residing 
in our country in Africa, or such other place as Congress shall 
deem most expedient. And the Society shall act to effect this 
object in co-operation with the General Government and such 
of the States as may adopt regulations on the subject." — Con. 
of tlie Society, Art. II 

The "exclusive" object here specified precludes and denies 
the claim of missionary and anti-slavery objects afterwards 
set up at the North to obtain patronage. The reference to 
the General and State Governments shows that the " object " 
was such as those governments were expected to favor. The 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 343 

Constitution has no Preamble with statements of reasons or 
motives for Colonization, and gives no hints whether its ope- 
rations were expected to facilitate emancipation or strengthen 
slavery. This ambiguity has enabled its advocates to urge 
one class of arguments at the North and an opposite class at 
the South, and obtain funds from both the friends and the 
enemies of slavery. But the real object may be known 
from its operations, of which we present a specimen. The 
Maryland Colonization Society, auxiliary to the American, 
received large funds from the State Legislature with which 
it transported to Africa, in 1834, " two ship loads of colored 
people, who were coerced as truly as if it had been done with 
a cart-whip." So said Rev. R. J. Breckenridge D.D., a mem- 
ber of the American Colonization Society, at its annual meet- 
ing, the same year. This policy the gentleman censured at 
the time, but has since openly defended it, as did likewise 
Mr. Bxodnax, in the Legislature of Virginia, when a bill was 
under discussion, making appropriations to the same object. 
" It is idle," said Mr. Brodnax, " to talk about not resorting 
to force. Everybody must look to the introduction of force 
of some kind or other. If the free negroes are willing to go, 
they will go. If not, they must be compelled to go." There 
was a clause in the bill for compulsory transportation. This 
was, indeed, stricken out to save appearances, but the end 
was nevertheless reached, by menaces, and ill treatment. 

The desired effects of colonization have been abundantly 
stated in the publications of the Society, and the speeches 
and writings of its members. 

" The execution of this scheme would augment, instead of diminish, the 
value of the property left behind." — African Repository (the Society's 
organ), Vol. I., p. 227. 

" By removing the most fruitful source of discontent (free blacks) from 
among our slaves, we should render them more industrious and attentive to 
our commands." — Address Putnam Co. Geo. Col. Soc. 

" The tendency of the scheme, and one of its objects, is to secure 
slaveholders and the whole Southern country against certain evil conse- 
quences growing out of the present three-fold mixture of our population." — 
Address of a Virginia Col. Soc., Af Rep., IV., 274. 



344 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

" By removing these people (free blacks) we rid ourselves of a large 
party who will always be ready to assist our slaves in any mischievous 
design they might conceive." — Af Rep., I., 176. 

" By thus repressing the increase of blacks, the white population would 
be enabled to reach, and soon overtake them : the consequence would be 
security." — Af. Rep., IV., 344. 

It would be easy to fill a long chapter with testimonies to 
this single point. We are warranted, therefore, in saying 
that the grand object of the Colonization Society is the in- 
creased profitableness and security of slavery. 

3. It discourages emancipation. — The Colonization So- 
ciety has been patronized at the North, under the idea, held 
up by its agents, that it encourages and assists slaveholders to 
emancipate and colonize their slaves. It is true that some 
emancipations have been made in connection with coloniza- 
tion. But the efforts of the Society have been chiefly directed 
to the colonization of the free. And it is found that the ratio 
of emancipations, since the Society was formed, has greatly 
decreased, on the whole. Neither Judge Washington, Henry 
Clay, Mr. Madison, nor Mr. Carroll, slaveholding Presidents 
of the Society, have ever emancipated and colonized a single 
slave, though Judge Washington sold fifty-four at one time, 
to be sent to New Orleans ! The whole amount of the colon- 
ization of manumitted slaves, in eighteen years, ending in 
1835, was eight hundred and nine, equal to the increase of slave 
population for five days and a half !* It is not known 
that the process has been more rapid since. 

And yet, colonization was constantly held up, then and after- 
wards, as the only safe and proper mode of emancipation, thus 
quieting the consciences of those who thought they could not 
spare (or who, in fact, could not command) the additional ex- 
penses of transportation to Africa. 

" Colonization is the only possible mode of emancipation at once safe 
and rational." — Speech of Mr. Custiss, \2th An. Report. 



* Up to about this time the funds raised by the Society amounted to $220,449, 
and it had incurred a debt of §45,645, making an expenditure of $266,094.— Jaifn 
Inquiry, p. 78. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 345 

"Colonization is the only expedient by which these evils (of slavery) 
can be mitigated." — Speech of J. A. Dix, Af. Rep., IV., 108. 

" To this country it offers the only possible means of gradually ridding 
ourselves of a mighty evil." — 1st Rep. N. Y. Col. Soc. 

" I would urge this system of Colonization, as the only rational plan that 
has yet been suggested for relieving our Southern brethren of the curse of 
slavery." — Speech of Chancellor Walworth. 

A moderate use of common sense and of the rudiments of 
arithmetic should have sufficed to dispel the delusion of ter- 
minating American Slavery by the colonization of the slaves 
to Africa. It is astonishing how such a project could have 
imposed itself upon the credulity of the shrewd and calcula- 
ting people of the North. Emancipation on the soil had been 
the policy of the northern and eastern states. No other pro- 
cess of abolishing slavery had ever been known or attempted 
anywhere. The revolutionary fathers, who had sought and 
expected the abolition of slavery, had expected it in no other 
way. Before the forming of the Colonization Society in 
1816, no friend of freedom advocated any other method. 
But in a few brief years the propagandists of colonization had 
saturated the public mind with their new and whimsical 
dogma. From the pulpit, from the forum, from the press, 
from halls of legislation, and by itinerating agents, the propo- 
sition was continuously reiterated, with all the solemnity of 
an oracle, that emancipation and colonization must, of neces- 
sity, go hand in hand ! The idea came, at length, to be re- 
garded with the reverence due to a self-evident truth, and to 
question it was to incur suspicion of insanity. 

The influence of this sentiment upon the process of emanci- 
pation cannot be doubtful. Emancipations on the soil had 
been constantly going on, at the South, till the doctrine was 
proclaimed that the free people of color, as a nuisance, must 
be removed out of the country, and that future emancipations 
and transportations must go hand in hand. To emancipate 
and colonize, even when practicable, was a double burden, 
and all other emancipation was now, by the new formed public 
sentiment, proscribed. 



346 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

Equally and necessarily proscriptive was the same doctrine, 
against all plans and efforts to procure a general abolition of 
slavery on the soil, and no other general abolition would be 
practicable. It might have been predicted, beforehand, that 
the influence of the Colonization Society would be arrayed 
against any earnest efforts for the abolition of slavery. It 
could not be otherwise, while the- Society held the language 
we have quoted, insisting that colonization was the only 
method of emancipation. And this has involved the Society 
in the positions hereafter specified. 

4. In violation of its own Constitution, it denies to 
the free people of color their essential rights of resi- 
dence in the land of their birth, and it denies the 

RIGHT OF THE SLAVE TO EMANCIPATION ON THE SOIL. This is 

proved by the course of the Maryland and Virginia auxiliaries, 
and also by the speeches of Dr. Breckenridge and Mr. Brod- 
nax, already quoted. We add another testimony from the 
highest authority, and of a recent date : 

Hon. Henry Clay, in his recent letter to Richard Pindell, (see New 
York Tribune, March 10th, 1849,) "after full and deliberate consideration 
of the subject," lays it down w as an indispensable condition (of emancipation) 
that the emancipated slaves should be removed from the State to some 
colony." " The colonization of the free blacks, as they successively arrive, 
from year to year, at the age entitling them to freedom, I consider a condi- 
tion absolutely indispensable. Without it I would be opposed to any scheme 
of emancipation." The expense of this expatriation is, says Mr. Clay, to 
" be defrayed by a fund to be raised from the labor of each freed slave." 
The Af. Repository, April, 1949, says, let the North " show unto us a more 
excellent way," if they can. 

" In no other way could (can) it (slavery) be removed, than by planting 
colonies of free colored people on the coast of Africa." Speech of Rev. 
Dr. Bethune at Col. meeting, Phila., Af Rep., July, 1846, p. 222. 

" He (the colored man) is an exotic that does not and cannot nourish in 
American soil." Address of Judge Bulloch, Ky., commended by editor of 
Af. Rep., Ap. 1847, p. 103. 

" No ! There is no place for them in this country. It is not their land, 
and they never can be made at home here. There are difficulties in the 
way which no power of man can remove." Af. Rep. Nov., 1846, p. 348. 






slavery and freedom. 847 

5. It justifies slavery. 

'• We hold their slaves, as we hold their other property, sacred." (Af. 
Rep. L, 283.) "We know your rights, and we respect them." (lb. 
VII., 100.) "It" (the Society) condemns no man hecause he is a slave- 
holder." (lb. VII., 200.) "Acknowledging the necessity by which it3 
(slavery's) present continuance and rigorous provisions for its maintenance, 
are justified." (lb. III., 16.) "We believe that there is not the slight- 
est turpitude in holding slaves, under present circumstances." (lb. IX., 4.) 

" You cannot abolish slavery, for God is pledged to sustain it." — Letters 
to Hon. George P. Marsh, copied into Maryland Colonization Journal, Sep- 
tember 6, 1847, p. 44. 

"Slavery in the United States has resulted, and is destined still more to 
result in the permanent good and advancement of the negro race." — Letter, 
$c, p. 99. 

6. It not only discourages but condemns emancipation. 

" Policy, and even the voice of humanity, forbid the progress of manumis- 
sion." (.4/. Rep., IV., 268.) " It would be as humane to throw them from 
the decks in the middle passage, as to set them free in our country." — lb. 
IV., 226. 

7. It slanders the free people of color. Without do- 
ing this, and fostering prejudice against them, the scheme of 
colonizing them would have found little or no favor. 

" Free blacks are a greater nuisance than even slaves themselves." — Af. 
Rep. II., 189. 

" This class of persons is a curse and a contagion wherever they reside." 
— lb. III., 203. 

" A class the most corrupt, depraved, and abandoned." — //. Clay, lb. 
12. 

"An anomalous race of beings, the most depraved upon earth." — lb. 
VII., 230. 

" They constitute a class by themselves, out of which no individual can 
be elevated, and below which none can be depressed." — lb. VI., 118. 

" With some honorable exceptions, the free negroes are, as a class, indo- 
lent, vicious, and dishonest." — Memorial to Leg. of Va., Af. Rep. Am. 
Col. Soc, Jan., 1846, p. 45. 

Speaking of the 60,000 free colored inhabitants of Virginia, the above, 
memorial says, "Worthless and more than worthless." — P. 48.* 

* Compare these representations with the following : — Says Mr. Clay, " Each 
(migrant is a missionary, carrying with hint credentials in the holy cause of religion, 
civilization, and free institutions /" And so Africa is to be evangelized by sending 
out our nuisances as missionarit.s '. 



348 great struggle between 

8. It justifies their oppression. 

" Severe necessity places them (free negroes) in a class of degraded be 
ings." (Af. Rep., V., 238.) " This law," (by which free negroes are en 
slaved unless they leave the State,) *' odious and unjust as it may, at firs 
view, appear, &c, was doubtless dictated by sound policy, and its repea 
would be regarded with none by more unfeigned regret than by the friend 
of African colonization." — Powhattan Col. Soc 

9. It discourages their education and elevation. 

" If the free people of color were generally taught to read, it might be an 
inducement to them to remain in this country. We would offer them 
such inducement." — Southern Religious Telegraph, Presbyterian. 

" It must appear evident to all, that every endeavor to divert the attentic 
of the community, or even a portion of the means which the present crisi 
so imperatively calls for, from the Colonization Society, to measures calci 
lated to bind the colored population to this country, and seeking to rais 
them to a level with the whites, whether by founding colleges or in any othc 
way, tends directly in proportion that it succeeds, to counteract and thwar 
the whole plan of colonization." — New Haven, Conn. Religious Intell 
gencer, Congregational, July, 1831. 

This frank avowal discloses the cause of the oppositioi 
made in Connecticut, by leading colonizationists, soon aftei 
to the establishment of schools for colored children and youtl 
in Canterbury and New Haven. The writer remembers whei 
colored children were freely admitted to the public schools ii 
Connecticut, and when there were no separate pews for n( 
groes in the village and country churches. The growth of 
prejudice has kept equal pace with the progress, influence 
and popularity of the Colonization Society. 

10. It declares the prejudice against them innocei 
and incurable. This ground is assumed in self- vindication. 
For if the prejudice be criminal, the Society is a transgressor. 
And if it be cured, the enterprise of colonization becomes an 
abortion. 

" All the prejudices of society — prejudices which neither refinement, nor 
argument, nor education, nor religion itself can subdue — mark the people of 
color, whether bond or free, as the subjects of a degradation inevitable and 
incurable.'''' — Address Conn. Col. Soc. 

" Christianity cannot do for them here, what it will do for them in Afri- 
ca. This is not the fault of the colored man, nor of the white man, but an 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 349 

ordination of Providence, and no more to be changed than the laws of na- 
ture." — Fifteenth Annual Report, 47. 

11. It was pledged in advance to oppose abolition 
societies. 

•» The Society having declared that it is in no wise allied to any Abolition 
Society, in America or elsewhere, is ready, ivhcn there is need, to pass a 
censure upon such Societies in America." — Eleventh Annual Report. 

This was in January, 1828, more than four years before the 
organization of the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society, the 
earliest of the " modern " Societies. There had been no " abo- 
lition Societies" in the country, except those formed by Jay, 
Franklin, &c, soon after the Revolutionary war, and which 
were now nearly or quite extinct. The possible resuscitation 
of those Societies, or the organization of similar ones, must 
have been the contingency in view of which this gratuitous 
pledge of "censure" was given, in advance of any knowledge 
of their particular measures. No reference to the future and 
unforeseen " fanaticism " or " imprudence " of " modern abo- 
litionists," who had not then appeared, can furnish an explan- 
ation of this measure. Hostility to any efforts for the abolition 
of slavery is evident upon the very face of the declaration. 

Such was the Colonization Society, such its positions, and 
such its influence, at the commencement of the present agita- 
'tion of the slave question. And such they remain still. 
Philanthropists and friends of the enslaved were, for a long 
time, deceived and misled by it, regarding it as an instrument 
for the abolition of slavery, and some such possibly are de- 
ceived by it still, though hundreds of thousands have deserted 
: and abjured it. 

The Colonization Society has been, and still is, the true 
representative of the leading men in Church and State, on the 
subject of slavery. It furnishes the central point of their 
united efforts on that subject, where the political and ecclesi- 
astical elements controlling the Church and the State (in the 
manner described in the preceding chapters) are conjoined. 
The same statesmen who have controlled our Cabinets and 



350 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

Senates, the same theologians, professors, and doctors of 
divinity, who have controlled our General Assemblies, Gene- 
ral Associations, General Conferences, Synods, Bible and Tract 
Societies, and Missionary Boards, have come together and 
formed and controlled the Colonization Society. The same 
imposing array of honorable and reverend names are paraded 
on the various catalogues, and their doings and their policy 
are the same. Posterity will award to the one the same praise' 
or blame that they do to the other. 

After twenty years' discussion, the course and the character 
of the Colonization Society are not changed. Whatever may 
be said of other bodies, the increase of light, and the diffusion 
of intelligence, have made no'impression on the Colonization 
Society. It represents the class of politicians and ecclesias- 
tics resolutely opposed to liberty and progress. Among its 
leaders are the advocates and apologists of the new Fugitive 
Slave Bill — who preach against the paramount claims of 
"higher law." The infamous slave hunts resulting from the 
so-called " compromise measures," seem to have infused new 
life into it, and restored the energy it exhibited during the 
ascendency of pro-slavery riots, and the attempted legislative 
suppression of free discussion, from 1834 to 1837, of which 
some account will appear in the proper place. 

The Massachusetts Colonization Society held its Annual 
Meeting in Boston, May 26, 1852. Rev. Dr. Derby, of Phila- 
delphia, made a speech, in which he insisted that the colored 
people can never have their political rights in this country. 
He "was born in the South, had been nursed by a slave woman, 
had seen the black man under all circumstances, and in all 
parts of the United States, and yet he had never seen one 
that was a man." — " He dwelt at some length on the great 
blessing American slavery is conferring on the slave, in afford- 
ing him an opportunity to become acquainted with Chris- 
tianity, and secure the salvation of his soul." And yet, 
according to the same speaker, he could never rise in this 
country, and must therefore be colonized to Africa. Among 
the officers and prominent members of the Society present, 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 851 

" were many supporters of Mr. Webster and the Fugitive 
Slave law, and signers of the celebrated letter to him, con- 
gratulating him upon his 7th of March speech, in support of 
that bill of abominations." Among these was Rev. Dr. Woods, 
who pronounced the benediction at the close. " These gen- 
tlemen, grayheaded Doctors of Divinity, and cotton politi- 
cians of Boston, thumped their canes right heartily at the 
speech" of Dr. Derby. Robert Morris, Esq., a colored lawyer, 
of Boston, rose modestly, and wished to ask a few questions, 
but was refused. — Vide N. Y. Daily Tribune, May 28, 1852. 

It remains to say that the pretensions of the Colonization 
Society of doing much to evangelize Africa, and to check and 
limit the slave trade, have been found to be in keeping with 
its other pretensions. 

As late as 1833 or '31, Rev. Dr. Spring of New York, at a 

j colonization meeting in that city, lamented that the Society 

had done nothing for the religious instruction of the emigrants. 

The remedy he proposed was the employment of missionaries 

by the managers, acting as a Civil Government, at the expense 

of the colony, disregarding the objection urged that it would 

be (as he admitted it would) a " union of Church and State." 

But his measure was not adopted. J. B. Pinney, who was 

sent out as a missionary, became Governor of the colony. 

■ On his return, in 1836, he told the writer of this book that 

. nothing was doing for the conversion of the natives. In 1839, 

Mr. Wilson, the Missionary of the American Board, which is 

; controlled by Colonizationists, affirmed that the neighborhood 

i of the colony was not a proper station for a missionary, and 

that remoteness from the settlements was far more desirable. 

\ (See Missionary Herald, Sept., 1839.) 

Rum, gunpowder, and spear-pointed knives, have been 
, among the regular exports from this country to the colony of 
i Liberia. These are sold to the natives, and especially to the 
• slave traders, being the indispensable articles, of their traffic, 
, and the causes of the wars that furnish captives to be sold to 
, them as slaves. The slave trade, instead of being repressed, 
(as had been pretended) has been stimulated and encouraged. 



352 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

The colonists have maintained a regular traffic with them, 
and have visited their stations for that purpose. Shackles 
have been sold to them at the colonial settlement at Mensu- 
rado. The pages even of the African Repository (the So- 
ciety's official) bore testimony, in 1828, that the trade was 
increasing.* In 1837 or '38, Dr. Goheen, agent of the So- 
ciety, residing at Liberia, wrote in defense of the slave trade, 
and his letters were published without rebuke in the coloniza- 
tion papers of this country. 

Liberia has now become an independent Government. The 
political control of the Colonization Society over it has ter- 
minated, but it continues to busy itself with the task (accord- 
ing to its own account) of supplying it with " nuisances " whom 
" Christianity can never elevate in this country" for "mis- 
sionaries" and "statesmen" — to " evangelize the heathen, and 
build up an empire in Africa I" 



* We have not room for the particulars; but if the reader will refer to Jay's 
Inquiry, pp. 55 to 61 (sixth edition), he will find ample evidence, furnished by the 
Colonization Society itself, that the boast of suppressing the slave trade was un- 
founded, and that it was even carried on in the Colony. 



1 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 353 



CHAPTER XXX. 

ABOLITION OF SLAVERY IN THE BRITISH COLONIES. 

Premature triumphs over the supposed abolition of the Slave Trade — Effects of this 
illusion from 1807 till 1823 — Revival of anti-slavery effort in England — Organiza- 
tion of a Society on the basis of gradualism — Writings of Elizabeth Ileyrick in 
favor of immediatism — Pamphlet of Clarkson on the illegality of Slavery — Change 
of views and measures — Increased efficiency — Petitions to Parliament — Commence- 
ment of Anti-Slavery Reporter, 1825— Parliamentary discussions, 1828-9-30— 
Anti-Slavery meetings — Eminent Advocates— Methodist Conferences, Rectors and 
Curates, and Doctors of Divinity, enlisted— Dr. Andrew Thomson of Edinburgh. 
Bishop of Bath and Wells— Daniel O'Connell, George Thompson and others- 
Protest of Clarkson and Wilberforce against American Colonization Society — 
Other political reforms advanced abolition — Ministry of William IV. — Prominent 
statesmen — Influences in the West Indies— Missionaries among the Slaves — Op- 
posed by the planters — Increased feeling in England — Numerous petitions — Can- 
didates for Parliament questioned — Treatise of Judge Jeremie — Persecutions of 
the Missionaries — Outrages against the negroes, 1831 — Trial of Mr. Kuibb — Hi:> 
return to England — Increased agitation — Memorials of Missionary Societies — Gov- 
ernment orders the demolished chapels to be rebuilt — Orders insolently disre- 
garded — Committees of Inquiry in Parliaments-Pretended preparations for free- 
dom — Witnesses examined before Parliamentary Committees — Feeble defenses of 
the Slave party — Plans of emancipation — Passage of the Act of Abolition — 
Apprenticeship — Final Results — Testimonials — Slavery abolished in the British 
East Indies — Lessons of instruction. 

The slave trade and the slavery of this country, during its 
colonial state, were substantially the same with the slave trade 
and the slavery of the other British American Colonies, in- 
cluding the British West India Islands. A common origin, a 
common character, and a common relation to British law and 
to the British Government, pertained to them. They grew up 
together, claiming the shelter of the same royal grants, the 
same acts of Parliament for regulating the trade to Africa. 
They claimed the benefit of the same judicial precedents and 
legal opinions. The friends of liberty in England, for a cen- 

23 



354 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

tury past, have sympathized and corresponded with those 
in this country, on the subject. It seems proper to pre- 
sent a brief account of the recent anti-slavery struggle in 
Great Britain and Ireland, the abolition of slavery in the 
British West Indies, and the results of that measure. 

The error of supposing that the slave trade could be, in 
reality, abolished, while slavery itself was permitted to exist, 
has been already noticed,* as also the kindred error of sup- 
posing that the abolition of the slave trade, even if it could 
be accomplished, would virtually abolish slavery.f These 
delusions prevailed among the friends of liberty, on both 
sides of the Atlantic, with few and solitary exceptions. The 
legal abolition of the African slave trade by Great Britain 
and America, in 1807-8, was hailed as the grand jubilee of 
the colored race. The warfare was supposed to have been 
accomplished, and that nothing more remained but to cele- 
brate the achievement, and immortalize the names of the 
victors. Celebrations were held, orations were delivered, pic- 
tures were painted and engraved, and poems were written 
and dedicated to noble Dukes4 Nothing, in fact, in the way 
of gratulation, triumph, and glorification, was left undone. 
Demonstrations, to a certain extent, in this direction, might 
have been very well, had they been so shaped as to furnish 
incentives to farther and similar efforts, not forgetting that 
the slaves were still left in their chains, that not one of them 
had been released by the prohibition of the slave trade, and 
that, in Great Britain at least, the measure had been carried, 
in certain circles, by arguments conceding the undisturbed 
continuance of slavery itself. As it was, the gratulation was 
disproportionate and premature, tending to relax effort, to re- 
press inquiry, and discountenance further aggressive measures. 
On both sides of the Atlantic has this influence been felt ; 
and in America it is felt still. We content ourselves to gar- 
nish the sepulchres of the early British and American aboli- 
tionists, while refusing to give effect to their labors. 

* Chapter VII. + Chapter X. J Copley's History of Slavery, %\\. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 355 

It required the whole time from 1807 to 1823, for British 
Abolitionists to recollect that the slaves in the colonies were 
still in bondage, and to discover that the African slave trade* 
was undiminished in extent and horrors. Even then the 
measures adopted were inadequate to the exigency. 

In 1823 was formed the " Society for the mitigation and 
gradual abolition of slavery throughout the British dominions," 
of which the " Patron and President was the Duke of Glou- 
cester." Among the Vice Presidents, twenty in number, were 
the Marquis of Lansdowne, the Earl of Bristol, Earl Nugent, 
Lord Suffield, Lord Calvert, Henry Brougham, M. P., Thos. 
Fowell Buxton, M. P., Thomas Clarkson, Stephen Lushing- 
ton, LL.D., M. P., and William Wilberforce, M. P., &c. Among 
the Committee were James Cropper, Esq., of Liverpool, Sam- 
uel Gurney, Esq., Zachary Macauley, Esq., T. B. Macauley, 
Esq., Thomas Sturge, Esq., Wm. Wilberforce, Jun., Esq., and 
Kev. H. Venn. 

The ground of immediate and unconditional emancipation 
was not yet taken by the great body of British abolitionists, 
as the name of this society gives evidence : 

" About this time considerable attention was excited by a small tract, 
widely circulated, entitled ' Immediate, not gradual, Abolition, or an Inquiry 
into the shortest, safest, and most effectual means of getting rid of West 
Indian Slavery.' This tract, though published anonymously, was generally 
understood to be the production of a talented and benevolent Lady, Miss 
Hope, of Liverpool."! — Copley' 's Histoiy, p. 329. 

The more common and prevalent account, however, is, that 
Elizabeth Heyrick was the first public advocate, in England, 
of the doctrine of immediate and unconditional abolition, as 



* It should, be mentioned, perhaps, that Messrs. Stephen and Wilberforce, iu 
1816, introduced and supported in Parliament the Registry Bill, designed to " pre- 
vent the illicit introduction of slaves from Africa," which was carried against a 
strong opposition from the Colonists end their partisans. But the history of the 
slave trade, since that time, as already shown (Chap. VII.), demonstrates the utter 
inefficiency of all measures for its suppression, during the continuance of slavery. 

t On inquiry, since writing the above, we have been told, on authority of .John 
Scoble, of London, that the pamphlet here attributed to Miss Hope was written by 
Elizabeth Heyrick (or rather Hcrrick, which is now said to be the correct spelling.) 



856 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

before taught by Hopkins and Edwards in America, and that 
she was the author of a pamphlet in vindication of that doc-, 
trine. — Vide British Reforms and Reformers, by H. B. Stanton. 

Another advance position, of almost equal importance, was, 
about this time, taken, in a pamphlet by the venerable Thomas 
Clarkson. The reader will recall the fact, already noticed, 
that little progress was made in Parliament towards the legis- 
lative prohibition of the slave trade, until William Pitt demon- 
strated, on a certain occasion in the House of Commons, that 
the slave trade (all its high pretensions of legality notwith- 
standing) had been, from the beginning, illegal. A similar 
position was now taken by Mr. Clarkson, concerning slavery 
itself in the British Colonies. In doing this, however, he only 
revived and re-affirmed the old doctrine of Granville Sharp.* 

In this pamphlet Mr. Clarkson showed, to the satisfaction 
of the British people, that there never had been any legal 
slavery in any of the British Colonies. All had been usurpa- 
tion and assumption from the beginning. 

He affirmed "that the planters can neither prove a moral 
nor a legal right to their slaves." Having examined the moral 
right of the claim, he proceeded to argue the illegality of 
slavery : 

" He brought the slaveholder's claim to the test of original grants, or per- 
missions of Government, act of Parliament, charters, or English laws." 
He showed " that neither the African slave trade, nor West Indian slavery 
would have been allowed at first, but for the misrepresentations and false- 
hoods of those engaged in them " — " that the original Government grants 
and permissions had their origin in fraud and falsehood ; and if the premises 
fall, all conclusions and concessions grounded on them must fall, too."- 
" Then, as to charters — slavery had indeed been upheld and kept together 
by the laws which the charters gave those Colonies power to make ; that 
now slavery, nevertheless, was illegal, for in all the charters it was 
expressed that the laws and statutes made under them must not be repug- 
nant, but conformable to the laws of Great Britain. But these did not 
allow of slavery." — "Indeed, the slaveholders themselves admitted that if 
debarred whatever was repugnant to the laws of England, they did not 
see how they could have any title to their slaves, likely to be supported by 

i See Chap, VI. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 357 



the laws of England. In fact, the Colonial system was at constant vari- 
ance with the whole spirit and letter of the English Constitution." — Cop- 
ley's Hist., pp. 317-18. 

There can be no doubt that the dissemination and reception 
of these views exerted a most powerful influence in producing 
a Parliamentary prohibition of slavery in the Colonies of 
Great Britain. It is difficult to conceive how these views 
could be controverted without virtually demanding a reversal 
of the decision of Lord Mansfield in the Somerset case, in 
1772 ; and equally difficult to see why, if that decision was 
correct, the reasoning and the inferences of Mr. Clarkson do 
not apply to the Continental as well as to the Island Colonies 
of Great Britain, continuing, as they did, until July 4, 1776, 
under the aagis of Great Britain. This being established, it 
would be natural to inquire whether or how the memorable 
Declaration of the States, at that date, could have legalized 
the previously illegal slavery of this country. 

But to return. The meliorating and gradual policy termi- 

, nated, as might have been foreseen. The British Govern- 

' ment, in response to anti-slavery petitions, entered readily 
into measures for mitigating the condition of slavery, as cheap 
as they were useless, proposing to provide means of religious 
instruction for the slaves, to extend their privileges, to receive 
their testimony in courts, to protect their rights of marriage 
and property, to remove obstructions to manumissions, to pre- 
vent the separation of families, to restrain the power of arbi- 

. trary punishment, especially the flogging of females, and to 
establish a Savings' Bank for the use of slaves. All these 

1 reforms were committed to the care of the Colonial Legisla- 
tures, showing that the British Government and people had 
much to learn concerning slavery and slaveholding legislators. 

| This was in 1823. 

! These moderate concessions were rejected and trampled 
upon by the local authorities as subversive of all the control 

I of the master over the slave, ruinous to the Colonies, and 
unsafe for the inhabitants. 
In 1825, the Anti- Slavery Society commenced publishing 



358 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

and circulating " The Monthly Anti-Slavery Reporter" by 
Zachary Macauley, Esq., the father of Thomas B. Macauley, 
the Essayist and Historian. The second Annual Report 
lamented that so little had been accomplished for the benefit 
of the slaves. Very little indeed had been attempted in the 
Colonies, and even this had proved a failure. The slaves 
understood that the home Government had provided some- 
thing for them, which had been withheld. This made them 
the more discontented, and these discontents were magnified 
by the enemies of progress, and turned into arguments against 
it. Petitions were now circulated for the abolition of slavery 
in the Colonies. 

During two sessions of Parliament, little was done except 
in respect to particular abuses, as the persecution and expul- 
sion of certain missionaries and free persons of color, &c, 
also in respect to the Mauritius slave trade, the conduct of the 
Colonial Assemblies in rejecting or delaying the proposed 
reforms, &c. Much important information came to light in 
the discussions. In 1828, the discussion of this latter topic 
was resumed. The Secretary of State, Mr. Huskisson, repre- 
sented that some improvements had been made. Mr. Can- 
ning, then deceased, was quoted as having said, " Trust not 
the masters of slaves in what concerns legislation for slavery." 
A great public anti-slavery meeting was held, the Duke of 
Gloucester presiding, and Mr. Brougham, Mr. Wilberforce, 
Mr. Buxton, Rev. G. Noel, and other distinguished men, took 
a part in the proceedings. From this time petitions against 
slavery began to load both Houses of Parliament. 

In May, 1829, Mr. Brougham introduced in Parliament the 
subject of slave evidence, and a reform of Colonial judicature. 
Sir George Murray agreed to the propriety of this measure. 
Anti-slavery petitions were now multiplied. Discussions be- 
came general, and earnest debates among the people were 
frequent. Important meetings were held in different portions 
of Great Britain and Ireland. The Catholic emancipation 
bill brought in a new accession of strength from Ireland to 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 359 

the cause of the enslaved. The friends of liberty were 
encouraged also by the abolition of slavery in Mexico. 

In May, 1830, a general meeting of the Anti-Slavery Soci- 
ety was held, Mr. Wilberforce presiding; called to the Chair 
by Mr. Clarkson. The result was an earnest petition to Par- 
liament no longer to postpone the subject, but to fix a day, 
after which all children born should be free. 

This petition was presented to the Ilouse of Commons by 
Mr. Brougham, in July. A motion made by him, pledging 
the Ilouse " to take steps for the immediate mitigation and 
final abolition of slavery," was lost, fifty-six against twenty- 
seven. 

" Meantime, public meetings were held, and anti-slavery 
petitions prepared throughout the kingdom. One petition 
from Edinburgh received twenty-two thousand signatures, and 
from other places in like proportion." 

Men of learning, talent, piety, and influence, espoused the 
cause in public meetings, and missionaries who had been 
driven home from their field of labor in the West Indies, 
appeared in these meetings to bear their testimony against the 
slave system. The question became a political one, and elec- 
tions to Parliament turned on the position of the candidates. 
The Methodist Conferences arid ministers, in a body, exhorted their 
brethren, for the love of Christ, to vote for no candidates not known 
as pledged to the cause of abolition. Rectors and curates of the 
Established Church, as well as ministers of the dissenting 
sects, took an active part in anti-slavery meetings, and even 
lectured from place to place. Doctors of Divinity, instead of 
searching their Bibles in quest of apologies for slaveholding, 
made use of them for the purpose of urging upon the people 
and their rulers the duty of "breaking every yoke, and let- 
ting the oppressed go free." Among these, Rev. Andrew 
Thomson, D.D., of Edinburgh, signalized himself as a most 
efficient public advocate of immediate emancipation. The 
influence and the efforts of such men as Rev. John Angell 
James, of Birmingham, and the Rev. J. G. Pike (the author 
of " Persuasives to Early Piety"), were enlisted on the same 



360 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

side. In one word, the learning and the piety of Great 
Britain were earnestty, honestly, and without reserve or 
equivocation, thrown into the anti-slavery enterprise. 

At an anti-slavery meeting in Bath, the Bishop of Bath and 
Wells presided, and Mr. Wilberforce, after forty years labor 
to secure gradual and prospective measures, came forward to 
advocate immediate action. At this meeting an attempt was 
made to create a disturbance by clamor and hisses. Order 
being restored, a debate was held on the claims of the slave- 
holders to compensation. 

The excitement in the country ran high. " At Bristol, a 
most disgraceful uproar was made by the upholders of slavery, 
who interrupted a meeting, regularly commenced." At a sub- 
sequent meeting, there was an earnest debate. 

It was during the agitation and debates of this period that 
George Thompson, who afterwards lectured for a time in this 
country, became distinguished as an eloquent advocate of the 
cause, and acquired a reputation which afterwards gave him 
a seat in Parliament. Charles Stuart, also well known to the 
friends of liberty in this country, rendered efficient services 
at that period, both by his pen and his voice. Joseph Sturge, 
of Birmingham, a wealthy and talented gentleman, of the 
Society of Friends, was among the efficient laborers in the 
cause, as was also John Scoble, of London, the laborious and 
vigilant Secretary of the British and Foreign Anti-Slavery 
Society. 

The doctrines and measures of gradualism and melioration 
were now abandoned by abolitionists, for those of immediate 
and unqualified emancipation on the soil, and the claim of any 
compensation to the master was abjured. In these views, as 
well as in opposition to the characteristic principles and aims 
of the Colonization Society, (whose agents had solicited patron- 
age in England,) the venerable Clarkson and Wilberforce 
heartily concurred. On this latter topic, Mr. Clarkson repeat 
edly employed his pen. And one of the last acts of Mr. Wil 
berforce was the signature of a protest against the American 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 361 

scheme of expatriation, a short time before his death, which 
occurred in July, 1833. 

This salutary change in the policy, the measures, and the 
teachings of British abolitionists produced corresponding fruits. 
As soon as the public conscience was distinctly and pungcntly 
addressed, it began to be reached and operated upon to good 
purpose. 

Other causes concurred to favor the revolution in progress. 
The Catholic Emancipation bill of 1829, brought with it an 
accession of strength to the cause of slave emancipation, and 
the ■ celebrated champion of Irish enfranchisement, Daniel 
O'Connell, was always ready to advocate the claims of the 
negroes. 

The repeal of the odious Corporation and Test Acts,' in 
1828, placing dissenters on an equal ground of eligibility to 
office, and the similar concession to Catholic subjects, a few 
months after, encouraged freedom of discussion on general 
subjects, and brought into the field of political action large 
numbers who had learned to sympathize with the oppressed. 
The celebrated Reform bill of 1832 belongs to the same cate- 
gory, and may be mentioned here, though in advance of its 
chronological order. By this measure the unjust and dispro- 
portionate suffrage of the ancient boroughs, beyond their 
present proportion of inhabitants, in electing members to Par- 
liament, was done away, and the masses of the industrious 
people were, in some measure, restored to their political 
rights. It is pleasing to notice how all these democratic refor- 
mations favored the introduction of redress for the enslaved. 
And the reader will have observed the general fact, both in 
the British and American legislatures, that measures in behalf 
of justice and freedom are commonly carried in the popular 
branch first. The department nearest to the mass of the peo- 
ple and most directly responsible to them, is soonest reached 
by the voice of humanity and conscience.* 



* An argument designed to prove the worthlessness of democratic institutions 
has been drawn from the alleged fact that the enjoyment of universal suffrage in 



362 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

Add to this the new ministry, formed soon after the acces- 
sion of William IV., in 1830, were favorable, beyond all 
former precedent, to the cause of abolition and general free- 
dom. Grey, Lansdowne, Holland, Brougham, Durham, Al- 
thorpe, Howick, Melbourne, Palmerston, Goderich, Kussell, 
Auckland, Stanley, Graham, Denman. 

To these influences in England, we may add others in the 
West Indies. Christian missionaries were at work there. 
Religion, and a knowledge of letters had begun to reach and 
open the minds of the enslaved, for West Indian slavery had 
not as effectually bolted the doors of its prison-house against 
the light of heaven, as has the slavery of our North American 
States. British Protestantism had not learned nor taught that 
"■ oral instruction " was sufficient for slaves. Bibles, to some 
extent, had been furnished them, and they had been allowed 
to build chapels for worship. 

But the determined advocates of slavery were beginning to 
discover their mistake. They saw that intelligence and purity 
were incompatible with the condition of slavery. The mis- 
sionaries, too, with all their abundant prudence, (forbearing 
to instruct the slaves in their heaven-conferred rights,) had 
not learned to teach a religion that justified oppression, or that 
could be embraced without aspirations after freedom. The 
missionaries began to foresee a little of the struggle that was be- 
fore them, if the West Indies were ever to be christianized. 
They patiently labored on, waiting the event, while the plant- 
ers regarded them with suspicion, and watched for opportuni- 
ties and pretexts for ejecting them. The overruling provi- 
dence of God was visibly at work preparing the way for the 
change that was to take place. 

It was under this state of things that the anti-slavery agita- 
tion progressed in Great Britain. " Early in 1831, the num- 



America has never secured the abolition of slavery. The sophism lies in the noto- 
rious fact that the premises are untrue. Universal suffrage is not enjoyed in 
America; all the slaves, and most of the free people of color, being excluded 
from the polls. To establish the universal suffrage in America, would be to abolish 
American slavery. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 363 

ber of petitions presented in one session amounted to upward 
of live thousand." On motion of Mr. Buxton, April 15, the 
House of Commons resolved to consider, speedily, the best 
means of effecting the abolition of slavery throughout the 
British dominions, but a few days after the Parliament was 
adjourned. 

A public meeting of the Anti-Slavery Society was held, 
Lord Suffield presiding. "The speakers v/ere Mr. Buxton, 
Sir James Mackintosh, Dr. Lushington, Rev. D. Wilson, (since 
Bishop of Calcutta,) Mr. O'Connell, Mr. Sheil, Mr. Pownall, 
Bev. J. Burnett, Rev. Mr. Watson, Mr. Evans, Mr. Stephen, 
Rev. J. Cunningham. They insisted upon the utter extinc- 
tion of slavery by act of Parliament, a?id, to this end, the im- 
portance of " a judicious use, on the part of the people, of their rigid 
of choosing their representatives." " The formation of a new Par- 
liament was, in no small degree, influenced by these considera- 
tions."* 

At the " hustings," where, after the English custom, the 
candidates presented themselves to be questioned, while the 
people were voting, they were constantly and publicly inter- 
rogated by the individual voters, as they came up, one after 
another, " Will you vote for the abolition of slavery?' 1 and as the 
answer was yea or nay, (or dubious,) the vote was given or 
withheld. On these election days was fought the decisive 
battles of West Indian freedom. Under these influences was 
elected the first Reform Parliament which assembled at the 
close of the year 1832,f to signalize itself by one of the most 
glorious achievements of modern legislation. 

At the close of 1831 there appeared an important work on 
Colonial Slavery, by Judge Jeremie, late of St. Lucia. Its 
disclosures made a powerful impression upon the mind of the 
British nation. No longer were apologies needed for the 
" extravagant statements of over excited abolitionists." The 
workings of the slave system, the condition of the enslaved, 
and the demoralization of the masters, were shown to be alto- 

* Copley's Hist., p. 358. t lb., p. 444. 



364 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

getter and immeasurably worse than any of the abolitionists 
had ever supposed, or could have imagined. Documentary 
facts demonstrated that " truth is stranger than fiction," and 
" the poetry of philanthropy " became stale by the side of the 
records of jurisprudence. Judge Jeremie had been strongly 
prepossessed in favor of the slaveholders, had gone out there 
with the determination to administer, impartially, the laws 
of the country, had found the task utterly impracticable, and 
had returned. There could be no such thing as the reign of 
impartial law, in a community of slaveholders. One specifi- 
cation, illustrated by a variety of incidents, was this ; that, in 
no case before a court of justice, where the claims of slavery, 
or the interests of master and slave were involved, was the 
least reliance to be placed upon the testimony, under oath, of 
any slaveholder, however exalted his station, or however sanc- 
timonious his professions. 

About the same time that these disclosures were made in 
England, the West India Islands were becoming the theatre 
of new outrages, the knowledge of which, in England, soon 
after, could not fail to swell the tide of public indignation 
against slavery. 

" It had long been a trick of West Indian policy, when any measure 
favorable to negro emancipation, or at all bearing upon it, was in progress, 
to excite among the slaves some trifling brawl with their managers, which 
was then dignified with the formidable name of an insurrection, the military 
forces were called out to suppress it, at a wanton expense of negro blood, 
and then intelligence was sent home, by way of proving the unfitness of the 
negroes for emancipation." — Copley's Hist., 371. 

" In 1815, when Mr. Wilberforce gave notice of a bill for the registration 
of all Colonial slaves, a universal clamor was excited in the West Indies;" 
and sham insurrections were enacted for producing an effect in England. 
In 1823, the movements in England occasioned similar demonstrations. 
" Rumors of plots and insurrections were constantly assailing the public 
ear."— lb., p. 371-4. 

The close of the year 1831, and the beginning of 1832, 
were signalized by a more general and violent outbreak of 
slaveholding fury, which proved to be the death struggle of 
West India slavery. The moderate measures of melioration 



SLAVERY AND- FREEDOM. 865 

proposed by the British Government, produced the greatest 
excitement among the planters of Jamaica. They held public 
meetings, threatening to resist the mother country, and re- 
nounce allegiance to the King. This was directly calculated 
to rouse the slaves, yet they remained quiet, and measures 
were next resorted to, designed evidently to produce an ap- 
pearance of disturbance among them. The term of their 
usual Christmas holidays was unlawfully abridged, and when 
they were ordered to their work, before the close of their ac- 
customed recreations, a portion of them refused. This refusal 
was magnified into an insurrection, and proclamations in the 
name of the King were solemnly issued, announcing the pre- 
tended fact, and spreading consternation and alarm in every 
direction. The militia were ordered out, attacks were made 
upon the defenseless negroes, they were shot down in great 
numbers, and their cane-sheds and houses destroyed. " It 
does not appear that the negroes attempted the life of any 
person, but their determined insubordination was very evi- 
dent." By the testimony of the more moderate among the 
planters themselves, as well as of the missionaries, afterwards, 
there was no necessity, for any purposes of self-defense, for 
this wanton attack upon the negroes. 

But the malice of the slaveholders did not exhaust itself 
thus. The missionaries, Baptists, Wesleyans, and Moravians, 
shared a large portion of their fury. In their religious in- 
structions, they had abstained, even to a fault, from teaching 
the slaves the wickedness of slaveholding and the extent and 
sacredness of their own rights. It does not appear that they 
had directly admonished the slaveholders of their great sin. 
But they had undoubtedly done something for the moral and 
intellectual improvement of the slaves, — they had treated 
their converts as brethren in Christ — and this was an unpar- 
donable sin against the slave system ! From the beginning of 
the disturbances already mentioned, they had done all in their 
power to keep the slaves quiet, and to dissuade them from 
acts of insubordination and aggression. They had taken 
pains to disabuse some of them of the mistaken impression 



366 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

that the King had made them free. They had even entreated 
them to resume their labors. But all this did not suffice to 
conciliate or pacify the slaveholders. The missionaries were 
arrested, insulted, threatened with hanging, imprisoned, tried 
for their lives, and no arts of bribery or intimidation left un- 
tried to extort testimony against them that should seem to 
warrant their conviction and execution. The newspaper 
presses, in the meantime, teemed with the most inflammatory 
and shameless falsehoods against them, declaring that "it 
would be a grateful exhibition to the island to see a dozen of 
them gibbeted." One editor called on the public to "raze 
their chapels to the ground, and then take away their lives." 
When no charges could be substantiated against them, they 
were nevertheless incarcerated in filthy prisons, and by this 
means, perhaps, chiefly, they escaped, for a season, the rage 
of the mob. When, at length, they were bailed out, the 
magistrates who had extended to them this favor, were de- 
nounced and villified in their turn. Even the more moderate 
and enlightened portion of the inhabitants were led to con- 
clude that the missionaries must have been very imprudent. 
Their friends strongly urged them to leave the island, assur- 
ing them that their usefulness was at end. On every side 
they encountered countenances distorted by expressions of 
malice and revenge. 

At this critical juncture, the arrival of some new missiona- 
ries, along with Mr. Burchell, a missionary who had been to 
England for his health, was made the occasion for a new out- 
break. Mr. Burchell was immediately arrested, and absurdly 
charged with having participated in the rebellion. He was 
liberated on bail. Mr. Knibb and his companions were again 
summoned to answer to charges of having preached in an un- 
licensed house to a large congregation of negroes and others. 
After examination they were discharged. But the fury of 
the slaveholders could no longer be restrained. They assem- 
bled in mobs, demolished the chapels of the missionaries, and 
threatened their lives. " Both magistrates and militia were 
actively engaged in this work." Finding it unsafe to remain 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 367 

on shore, the missionaries sought shelter on board some 
British vessels in the harbor, but the captains were afraid to 
receive them, lest the inhabitants should refuse to load their 
vessels. At length, Captain Trefusis consented to receive 
them, till the excitement subsided. 

The missionaries memorialized the Governor,, protesting 
their innocence, and asking redress for the loss of their cha- 
pels. The Governor issued a proclamation denouncing these 
acts of violence, and enjoining on the magistrates to quell all 
disorderly meetings, to protect property, and bring the of- 
fenders to justice. But the proclamation was torn down from 
the walls. The very persons called upon to bring offenders 
to justice, were themselves the offenders. 

" The most base and malignant efforts were still made to 
implicate the missionaries." Negroes were threatened, and 
even cruelly tortured to make them testify that the missiona- 
ries — especially that Mr. Burchell — had excited them to rebel. 
But they steadily affirmed the contrary, and the persecutors 
were defeated in this part of their scheme. Public meetings 
were, however, held by them, at which "gentlemen" regretted 
that they were not present at the destruction of the chapels ; 
others made speeches, declaring that they must " get rid of 
the Baptists ;" that if the House of Assembly would not ex- 
pel them, other measures must be taken ; that "neither ought 
the Wesleyans to be allowed to remain;" that Mr. Murray (a 
"Wesleyan missionary) should be informed that " it would be 
at the risk of his life that he attempted to preach," &c. Reso- 
lutions to the same effect were adopted at meetings in differ- 
ent parts of the island, declaring that they must "get rid of all 
sectaries," or dissenting ministers. Clergymen, however, of 
the Church Establishment, who favored the religious instruc- 
tion of the negroes, found little less favor at their hands. 

Mr. Knibb was released the 1-ith of February, after a pe- 
( riod of imprisonment, but was soon after informed of a de- 
sign against his life, and his house was the same evening 
, assaulted. Similar attacks were made upon others. 

" On the evening- of Mr. Burchell's release, a white mob 



368 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

collected around his lodgings, vowing they would tar and 
feather him." By the exertions of the colored people, and 
the presence of the chief justice, they were deterred from 
their purpose, on the condition that Mr. B. should leave the 
island, to which he consented, and a detachment guarded him 
through the streets to embark. Messrs. Gardner and Knibb 
were subjected to trial the following week, and the next thing 
we hear is "that this very same William Knibb, who had 
been treated as an incendiary, a promoter of rebellion, was 
employed to examine certain negroes, and find out, if possi- 
ble, the causes of the rebellion." The result proved that the 
violent meetings of the slaveholders, already mentioned, at 
which they threatened to resist the British Government and 
throw off their allegiance to the King, was the first thing that 
made the slaves suspect that the British Government and the 
King had ordered their liberation. 

Mr. Knibb was, nevertheless, urgently requested by some 
of the magistrates to leave the island, and finding it impossi- 
ble to be longer useful in that field of labor, he consented, in 
April, 1832, to do so, and was appointed by the other mis- 
sionaries to represent their case to the people of England. 
This act sealed the overthrow of slavery in the British West 
Indies. The revelations of Mr. Knibb, on his return home, 
convinced the British nation that Slavery and Christianity 
could not co-exist in the Islands, and the doom of slavery 
became certain. Some attempts were, in the meantime, made 
•by the missionaries remaining in Jamaica to resume their 
labors, but in vain. The further preaching of the Gospel 
among the slaves awaited the abolition of slavery. 

The Missionary Societies in England, through their com- 
mittees, represented to the Colonial Secretary of State, Lord 
Goderich, the outrages that had been committed in Jamaica. 
" Instructions were accordingly forwarded to Lord Mulgrave, 
the newly appointed Governor of Jamaica, and by him 
recommended to the House of Assembly, to provide means 
for rebuilding the thirteen Baptist and four Wesleyan chapels, 
so wantonly and illegally destroyed." " These recommenda- 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 369 

tions were disregarded, or rather, insolently rejected," thus 
revealing to the British Government the temper of the slave 
party. But it was found necessary, for the security of all 
houses of worship, to enact a law for the future, that if any 
such building should be injured or destroyed by a mob, the 
damage should be repaired by the count}'. Committees of 
inquiry were instituted in Parliament respecting these out- 
rages, and respecting the pretended rebellion on the part of 
the negroes, and the whole truth of the case, at last, came to 
light. The pretense of preparing the slaves for freedom, 
while opposing by violence their instruction, was thoroughly 
exposed. The meetings of Missionary Societies became anti- 
slavery meetings. The Anti-Slavery Society took the ground 
of immediate and unconditional emancipation, and from every 
part of the United Kingdom there came up one united de- 
mand for the utter abolition of slavery. 

" On the 9th of June, 1832, Lord Goderich addressed a circular to the 

Governors of the Colonies, announcing to them the formation of a Commit- 

1 tee in the House of Commons, in consequence of the numerous petitions 

■ for the abolition of slavery, to consider and report what measures it might 
, be expedient to adopt with that view.'" — Coplcy^s Hist., 430. 

1 A similar committee was appointed in the House of Lords. 
: A large number of witnesses were examined before both of 
1 these committees, and voluminous statistical facts were intro- 
: duced, particularly by Mr. Buxton, touching the main ques- 
: tions concerning slavery, and the workings of emancipation 
: wherever it had been tried. The slave party did their best 
: to sustain themselves during these investigations, but their 
efforts only served to establish the positions of the abolition- 

■ ists. Their " reluctant admissions and awkward apologies or 
i evasions of adverse witnesses," says Copley, "only served to 

confirm and establish the views of all thinking and impartial 
. persons on the other side." 

The objections that emancipation would not be safe, that 

the liberated slaves would rise against their masters, that the 

Islands would be reduced to a state of anarchy and overrun 

• with idlers and vagabonds — objections once so powerful as 

24 



370 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

to stagger the faith of philanthropists themselves, were now 
completely overthrown, and all the terrors they had created 
were dispelled, in the light of well attested historical facts. 
The " horrors of St. Domingo" were shown to be the horrors 
of slavery, and not of freedom. The history of emancipation 
was found to be the history of the most beneficial results. 

The ancient Romans had tested the policy of emancipation, 
to obtain soldiers in their wars against Hannibal. The testi- 
mony of Tiberius Gracchus, confirmed by Cicero, and approved 
by Montesquieu, assures us of the salutary effects. Chris- 
tianity had abolished slavery throughout the Roman Empire 
without disaster. The feudal system had been displaced in 
modern Europe, and nobody deplored the change. English 
slaves liberated, a few centuries ago by their Irish masters, 
did' not cut the throats of their benefactors. In Chili, every 
child born after the 10th of October, 1811, was declared free: 
in Buenos Ayres, after January, 1813. In Colombia, all slaves 
bearing arms were emancipated July 19, 1821, and provisions 
made for emancipating the remainder, amounting to two hun- 
dred and eighty thousand. In Mexico, Sept. 15th, 1829, 
instantaneous and unconditional emancipation was extended 
to every slave. In Guadaloupe, eighty-five thousand slaves 
were set free in 1794, when there was a population of only 
thirteen thousand whites. At the Cape of Good Hope, thirty 
thousand Hottentots were emancipated in 1823. In all these 
instances, the change had taken place without producing any 
unhappy results. 

Facts, of which these are a specimen, when spread out 
before the British Government and the British public, pre- 
pared the way for a still more signal and illustrious exempli- 
fication of the safety of doing right! 

Matters in Jamaica, in the meantime, were ripening for the 
final result. Lord Mulgrave, the new Governor sent from 
England, in his speech to the Colonial Assembly, had recom- 
mended the religious instruction of the slaves. So far from 
responding to the sentiment, the Assembly recorded its threats 
of revolt from the British Government, whereupon the Gov- 






SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 371 

ernor dissolved the Assembly. A new election, under the 
Reform bill, which extended, it seems, to the Colonies, secured 
an Assembly of more moderate and liberal views. 

The first reformed British Parliament assembled about the 
close of the year 1882. Mr. Buxton soon gave notice of a 
motion for the abolition of slavery, unless the Government 
should take the matter into its own hands. Lord Althorpe 
stated, in reply, that it was the intention of the Government 
to do so, and that he would shortly bring a bill before the 
House, which he trusted would be both safe and satisfactory. 
The nation now waited for this measure in almost breathless 
suspense. 

The 23d of April, 1833, was the day appointed for bring- 
ing it forward, and the Anti-Slavery Society improved the 
interim by holding a public meeting in Exeter Hall, at which 
speeches were made by Lord Suflield, Mr. Buxton, Joseph 
John Gurney, Earl Fitzwilliam, Rev. J. W. Cunningham, G. 
Strickland, M.P., Rev. J. Burnet, H. Pownall, Esq., Mr. Geo. 
Stephen, Lord Milton, Dr. Lushington, and others. 

u A still more important meeting was held in the same hall 
a few days afterwards," consisting of three hundred and sixty- 
nine delegates from various parts of the United Kingdom. 
"More than three hundred of the delegates attended at the 
house of Earl Gre}^, to present a memorial, which was read 
by Mr. Gurney." The deputation had an audience with Lord 
Althorpe, and with Mr. Stanley, the Colonial Secretary of 
State. They represented the necessity of immediate and total 
emancipation, in the full confidence that such an emancipation 
would be peaceable. These views were embodied in a memo- 
rial to Lord Grey, and exerted, no doubt, a strong influence 
upon the Government. 

The plan first proposed, however, was unsatisfactory. It 
contemplated a compensation of £15,000,000 to the planters. 
which was to be paid out of the earnings of the negroes. It 
proposed a twelve years' apprenticeship, during which time 
the compensation money was to be earned. 

Abolitionists justly contended that compensation was due, 



372 GKEAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

if at all, to the slave, and not to the master. They contended 
that emancipation should be entire and immediate. The 
planters, on the other hand, petitioned for compensation. 
While these questions were pending, the friends of emancipa- 
tion held another meeting, July 20, and protested against the 
objectionable features of the bill. 

The details of the act of emancipation were finally adjusted 
on this basis, viz : 

1. The entire extinction of slavery, to take place on the 1st 
of August, 1834. 

2. Field laborers, above six years old, to serve as appren- 
tices for six years, ending 1st of August, 1840. 

3. Domestic or house servants to serve as apprentices four 
years, ending first of August, 1838. 

4. Children under six years, to be free, without apprentice- 
ship. Children hereafter born to be free. 

5. The slaves to pay no part of their redemption money, 
but a compensation of £20,000,000 out of the public treasury 
to be paid to the planters, at the close of the apprenticeship. 

Other regulations were specified, for securing the rights of 
the apprentices and their masters. 

The bill passed the House of Commons August 7, the House 
of Lords, August 20, and received the royal assent August 
28th, 1833. 

It remains to record the results of this measure. 

The first of August, 1834, came and passed peacefully, with- 
out the slightest disturbance, in any of the islands. And 
there has been none since. 

In Antigua and Bermuda, the Colonial Legislatures pre- 
ferred to dispense with the apprenticeship system, believing 
immediate and complete emancipation to be safest, and desir- 
ing likewise the earlier reception of the compensation money, 
to which this measure would entitle them. They reaped the 
double reward of their sagacity, experiencing none of the per- 
plexity occasioned by the apprenticeship system elsewhere. 

In Jamaica, Barbadoes, and the other islands, the appren- 
ticeship went into operation, and worked as well as could 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 373 

have been anticipated. But its inconveniences and vexations 
led to its voluntary abandonment, and the entire freedom of 
the field laborers, on the first of August, 1838, two years be- 
fore the time limited in the statute. 

In Barbadoes, with a population of 140,000, only 20,000 
were whites. In Jamaica, with a population of 450,000, only 
37,000 were whites. 

In all the British emancipated colonies, with a population 
of about 1,125,000, only about 131,000 were whites, being a 
little more than one-ninth part. Yet the tramjuiiiuy of the 
inhabitants was not in the slightest degree disturbed. The 
testimony on this point has never been questioned. The Gov- 
ernor of Jamaica, Sir Lionel Smith, in his speech to the As- 
sembly, October 30, 1838, said : 

" The conduct' of the laboring population, who were the objects of yonr 
liberal and enlightened policy, entitles them to the highest praise, and proves 
how well they deserved the boon of freedom." "I trust there is every 
prospect of agricultural prosperity." 

To this speech the Assembly of Jamaica responded thus : 

u The House join with your Excellency in bearing testimony to the peace- 
ful manner in which the laboring population have conducted themselves in a 
state of freedom." 

Queen Victoria, in her speech to the British Parliament, 
February 5, 1839, said : 

" It is with great satisfaction that I am enabled to inform you, that 
throughout the ivhole of my West India possessions, the period fixed by law 
for the complete and final emancipation of the negroes, has been anticipated 
by acts of the colonial legislatures, and that the transition from the temporary 
system of apprenticeship to entire freedom, has taken place without any 

DISTURBANCE OF PUBLIC ORDER AND TRANQUILLITY." 

The islands, since emancipation took place, have been re- 
peatedly visited by philanthropists well known in both hem- 
ispheres, for the purpose of collecting information concerning 
the workings of freedom. James A. Thome, of Kentucky, 
(afterwards Professor at Oberlin,) in company with Joseph H. 
Kimball of New Hampshire, went thither in November, 1836, 
and returned in June, 1837. Joseph Sturge and Thomas 



374 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

Harvey of England took an elaborate survey in 1837. Joseph 
John Gurney followed in 1839-40. The results of these seve- 
ral investigations are before the public in three interesting 
volumes.* The trustworthiness of these highly respectable 
and competent witnesses has never been questioned. They 
all agree, substantially, in the particulars which follow, and 
which are extracted from the work of Thome and Kimball. 
Similar facts and testimonials have since been officially re- 
ported to the British Government, and published in the 
British Anti-Slavery Eeporter. The information on which 
the following propositions were founded, was obtained from 
large numbers of the principal planters, magistrates, and pro- 
fessional gentlemen on the island of Antigua, whose names 
are preserved in the volume, with their testimony in their own 
words. We give only the substance of the principal state- 
ments. 

1. " The transition from slavery to freedom was a great revolution, by 
which a prodigious change was effected in the condition of the negroes." 

2. " Emancipation (in distinction from apprenticeship,) was the result of 
political and pecuniary considerations, merely." 

3. " The event of emancipation passed peaceably. The gloomiest antici- 
pations had been previously entertained." 

4. " There has been, since emancipation, not only no rebellion in fact, but 
no fear of it." 

5. "There has been no fear of house-breaking,' highway robberies, and 
like misdemeanors, since emancipation." 

6. " Emancipation is regarded, by all classes, as a great blessing to the 
island." 

7. " Free labor is decidedly less expensive than slave labor." 

8. " The negroes work more cheerfully, and do their work better." 

9. " The negroes are more easily managed as freemen, than they were 
when slaves." 

10. " The negroes are more trustworthy, and take a deeper interest in 
their employer's affairs, since emancipation." 

11. "The experiment of Antigua proves that emancipated slaves can 
appreciate law." 



* (1.) Journal of J. A. Thome and J. H. Kimball. 
(2.) The "West Indies, in 1887, by Joseph Sturge and Thomas Harvey. 
(8.) Letters to Henry Clay, &c., by Joseph John Gurney. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 375 

12. " The emancipated negroes have shown no disposition to roam from 
place to place." 

13. " The gift of unrestricted freedom, though so suddenly bestowed, has 
not made the negroes more insolent than they were while slaves, but has 
rendered them less, so." 

14. " Emancipation has demonstrated that gratitude is a prominent trait 
of negro character." 

15. " The freed negroes have proved that they are able to take care of 
themselves." 

16. " Emancipation has operated at once to elevate and improve the 
negroes." 

17. " Emancipation promises a vast improvement in the condition of 
woman." 

18. " Real estate has risen in value since emancipation, mercantile and 
mechanical operations have received a fresh impulse, and the general con- 
dition of the country is decidedly more flourishing than at any former 
period." 

19. " Emancipation has been followed by the introduction of labor-saving 
machinery." 

20. " Emancipation has produced the most decided change in the views 
of the planters." 

21. " The progress of anti-slavery discussions in England did not cause 
the masters to treat their slaves worse, but, on the contrary, restrained them 
from outrage." 

For other similar statements we have not room. Distorted 
rumors have sometimes reached us from the islands, set afloat 
by interested managers and speculators, who, in the absence 
of the owners (many of whom reside in England) desire to 
depreciate the price of property, that they might become pur- 
chasers. The droughts have, once or twice, occasioned short 
crops. The embarrassments of estates arising under the old 
system have not disappeared instantly, and sometimes have 
resulted in bankruptcy as formerly. 

It is painful to add, that in Jamaica and Barbadoes, and 
some other islands, the Colonial Governments have, in various 
ways, oppressed and harassed the laborers, to diminish their 
wages, and prevent them from becoming proprietors of land. 
The fact that the negroes, to some extent, were becoming self- 
employers, has been made a pretext for introducing coolies 
from the East Indies, and treating them as though they were 



376 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

slaves, insomuch that the British Government has been obliged 
to interfere. 

The abolition of slavery in the British West Indies liberated 
800,000 slaves. This was followed, in 1843, by the abolition 
of slavery throughout the British dominions, which liberated 
more than twelve millions in the East Indies. 

The history of British anti-slavery effort and its results, is 
instructive in more aspects than one. It shows, in the strong 
light of practical experiment, the worthlessness of all partial, 
temporizing efforts, all schemes of preparation, amelioration, 
and gradualism, in striking contrast with the efficiency, power, 
safety, and success of efforts for a thorough, uncompromising, 
and radical removal of the evil. It shows the utter incom- 
patibility of slavery with a Christianity that earnestly attempts 
anything for the religious instruction and education of the 
slaves. It shows the resistless power of the religious senti- 
ment of a country to mould at its pleasure, to preserve or to 
overthrow the legislation of a country. It assures us that 
whenever the prevailing and recognized religion of America 
decrees the downfall of American slavery, it will fall. It re- 
veals to us the power of an enlightened public sentiment over 
a government less popular than our own. It exhibits to us 
the fiction of the legality of slavery holding a great nation in 
fetters until exploded by the kindling lights of religion and 
freedom. It shows us the power of a right-minded and per- 
severing minority, through the good Providence of God, to 
overcome mountains* of opposition, and dispel a chaos of 
error. It demonstrates that the increasing rage and madness 
of oppressors is the sure presage of hastening deliverance to 
the oppressed. 

* It is a mistake to suppose, as some do, that because the West Indies were remote 
from Great Britain, the slave power exerted but little influence on the home Gov- 
ernment. There was a time when it virtually bribed the courts, controlled Parlia- 
ment, and stood behind the throne. Statesmen and nobles, not to say monarchs 
and members of the royal family, were suspected of being secret partners in the 
African slave trade, or openly held investments in West India plantations. A large 
portion of the West India proprietors resided in England, and wielded a command- 
ing influence. A large share of the £20,000,000 compensation voted by Parliament, 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 377 



CHAPTER XXXI. 

DISTINCTIVE FEATURES OF AMERICAN SLAVERY. 

Jts essential principle — Human Chattelliood — Integral parts of the system — Its con- 
sistency and unity — Agreement of the theory with the practice — Slavery cannot 
co-exist with liberty. 

From the scenes and achievements of British philanthro- 
py, and of West India Emancipation, we come back again 
to our own land of boasted liberty and cherished human 
chattelhood, — the land in which about 113,000 slaveholders 
control twenty millions of human beings, — and where the 
question still hangs in suspense, whether the yoke can be 
broken. Before entering upon the history of the present 
straggle, it may be well to look directly into the face of the 
monster to be grappled with, and see wherein its strength 
lies. 

WHAT IS SLAVERY? 

" The slave is one who is in the power of a master to whom he belongs." 
— Louisiana Civil Code, Art. 35. " Slaves shall be deemed, sold, taken, 
reputed, and adjudged in law to be chattels personal, in the hands of 
their owners and possessors, and their executors, administrators, and assigns, 
to all intents, constructions, and purposes, whatsoever." — Law of South 
Carolina, 2 Brev. Dig. 229, Prince's Dig. 446, &c. 

" The cardinal principle of slavery, that the slave is not to be ranked 



never went to the West Indies to improve the plantations there ; but remained in 
England, some of it in the hands of dissolute nabobs, some in the hands of mer- 
chants and mortgagees, in consequence of the West India estates being deeply 
involved in debt by the system of slavery. This, with the continued absence of 
owners from their plantations, partly accounts for the reports which we still hear, 
of the pecuniary embarrassments and thriftlessness of many West India plantations. 



378 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

among sentient beings, but among things, as an article of property, a chattel 
personal, obtains as undoubted law, in all these [slave] States." — Stroud's 
Sketch, p. 23. 

This, then, is slavery, as it exists in America. God created 
man in His own image. He made him a little lower than the 
angels, crowned him with glory and honor, and gave him do- 
minion over the beasts of the field. But slavery reduces him 
to a thing, a commodity, an article of merchandise ! 

This is no flourish of rhetoric — no idle abstraction. So 
far as the power of man can accomplish such a result, it is 
accomplished by slavery. If it cannot take away the im- 
mortal soul of man, it deems, reputes, and adjudges him to 
have none ! It ranks him, not a little lower than the angels, 
but on a level with the beasts that perish ! 

The question of slavery or emancipation is not a question 
of cruel treatment or of kind treatment — of starvation or of 
full feeding. It is a question whether a man is to be re- 
cognized as a man, or as a brute — a person or a thing — a 
spiritual, moral being, or a mere lump of matter — a being 
gifted with volition and clothed with responsibility, or a mere 
piece of machinery — a being with, or without, rights, which 
the laws should protect. 

INTEGRAL PARTS OF THE SLAVE SYSTEM. 

These are such as are involved, of necessity, in the car- 
dinal principle of slavery, viz. : human chattelhood. We enu- 
merate the following : 

1. The unlimited authority of the slave-master or owner. 

2. The abrogation of marriage, and the family relation, 
among slaves. 

3. The power to enforce labor without wages. 

4. The incapacity of the slave to acquire or hold property. 

5. His incapacity to make contracts or bargains. 

6. His incapacity to enjoy civil, domestic or political rights. 

7. The liability of the slave to be sold, like other chattels, 
and separated from relatives. The authorized prosecution of 

the SLAVE TRADE ! > 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 379 

8. The absence of any adequate legal protection for the 
slave. 

9. The power of the master to forbid education and social 
religious worship, at his own discretion. 

10. The power of the legislatures of slave states to prohibit 
education, even by the masters, and to prohibit or restrict free 
social worship. 

11. The power of the legislatures of slave states to abolish 
freedom of speech and of the press, in general. 

CONSISTENCY AND UNITY OF THE SLAVE SYSTEM. 

The theory of American slavery agrees with its practice. 
The whole system of slave legislation grows legitimately out 
of the chattel principle upon which slavery is founded. And 
the most revolting usages and practices to be detected among 
the incidents and workings of the system are found to be in 
perfect keeping and harmony, both with the principle of hu- 
man chattelhood and with the slave code. 

1. The very idea of human chattelhood involves the idea 
of the unlimited control of the master, and the absolute de- 
fenselessness of the slave. Habits of tyranny and of ser- 
vility must follow, of course, with all the insecurity and 
outrage that grow out of them. 

2. The absence of legal marriage, and of the protected 
family relation, is manifestly essential to the idea of human 
chattelhood. Chattels are not married, and cannot constitute 
families. Chattels may be transferred, bought, sold, and used. 
The promiscuous intercourse of the sexes, especially at the 
bidding of the master, follows, of course, and is not to be 
censured by those who consent to the system, or to the prac- 
tice of slaveholding. 

3. Chattels never receive wages, or acquire or hold pro- 
perty. The deep poverty of the slave, and all the effects 
of that poverty, with the absence of a motive to labor, fol- 
low, of course. 

4. Chattels can make no contracts, not even the contract of 
marriage. And this is the law of the slave. 



380 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

5. Chattels can have no rights, and hence the slave can 
have none. 

6. Chattels may be bought and sold. Hence the existence 
of slavery involves, of necessity, the slave trade, as Henry 
Clay testifies. — Speech in the U. S. Senate, 1839. 

7. Chattels can claim no legal protection, and therefore the 
slave can have none. And all the cruelties of slavery must 
be tolerated. 

8. Chattels are not to be educated, or instructed in religion! 
The idea is an absurdity. If the slaveholders are right in 
holding slaves as chattels, they cannot be blamed for with- 
holding education and religious privileges from them. If the 
government may sanction or permit slaveholding, it must, 
to be consistent with itself, prohibit literary and religious 
instruction. 

9. The same may be said of the laws forbidding freedom 
of speech and of the press. Such freedom is manifestly im- 
practicable and unsafe in the presence of chattel slavery. The 
entire South attests this ; and thus far the testimony is truth- 
ful. If slavery is to be maintained, or even tolerated, then 
liberty, of course, is to be relinquished. This is self-evident. I 

The statutes of the slave states abundantly confirm the pre- 
ceding statements, as will appear by consulting Judge Stroud's 
" Sketch of the Slave Laws," published at Philadelphia in the 
year 1827. The " Black Code of the District of Columbia," 
by W. Gr. Snethen, Esq., will show that some of the worst 
features of the system are sanctioned on the national hearth- 
stone, and under "exclusive jurisdiction of Congress." And 
"Wheeler's Law of Slavery," (a large volume of "Reports") 
attests that slave enactments are not a dead letter. 

It has sometimes been represented that the severe laws of 
the South, especially those forbidding education and free re- 
ligious meetings to slaves and free people of color, are wholly 
or chiefly owing to the impertinent agitations of abolitionists, 
whose mischievous efforts, it is said, have made such regula- 
tions necessary, or have furnished occasions or pretexts for 
them. The ready answer to this, is that the enactments in 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 381 

question are found in "Stroud's Sketch," published in 1827, 
Jive 3'ears before the organization of the "modern" anti-slave- 
ry societies commenced, four years before the " Liberator " was 
issued by Mr. Garrison ; and that, according to Judge Stroud, 
the principal acts of that character, cited by him, bear date 
from 17-10 to 1770, long before the organization of the old 
Anti-slavery Societies, by Jay and Franklin. So well known 
is this fact that occasion has sometimes been taken from it, to 
represent these severe laws as being antiquated, obsolete, and 
a dead letter ! For the refutation of this falsehood, we have 
only to cite the testimony of the Presbyterian Synods of 
Kentucky and of South Carolina and Georgia, and the Vir- 
ginia Revised Code of 1819. A mass of authenticated facts, 
chiefly sustained by Southern testimony, and showing that the 
practical workings of the system correspond, at all points, 
with the statutes defining it, may be found in a volume en- 
titled "American Slavery as it is, by the testimony of a 
thousand witnesses," — also in several unimpeachable narra- 
tives, and the Southern newspapers of every month in the 
year. " No people," says the philosophical and learned Dr. 
Priestley, "have ever been found to be better than their laws, 
though many have been known to be w r orse." 

Such is the system that controls and wields the Government 
of the United States, as shown in preceding chapters. 

Such is the system, sheltered and sanctioned, as we have 
already seen, in the prominent religious sects in this country, 
— the system which the Christianity of the country must over- 
throw, — or to which it must succumb and conform. 

Such is the system with which human liberty, in America, 
is summoned to contend, or to which it must yield. 

Who are enlisted in the struggle? What are they doing? 
What are the prospects before them? These are amongst the 
questions before us, in the succeeding chapters. 



382 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 



CHAPTER XXXII. 

THE PRESENT ANTI-SLAVERY AGITATION IN AMERICA — ITS 
CAUSES, ORIGIN, AND CHARACTER. 

Discussions caused by the Missouri Compromise — Rebuke of the dough-faces at the 
ballot-box, 1820— Benjamin Lundy, 1821 and afterwards— Missionary enterprise 
advocated as the harbinger of universal liberty — Revived doctrine (among active 
Christians) of immediate and unconditional repentance— This doctrine antago- 
nistic to conservatists in the Church, and their Colonization Society — Spirit of 
ethical inquiry — Social Reforms — Temperance — Peace — An age of newspapers, 
lecturers, lyceums, popular discussions, and voluntary Associations — William 
Lloyd Garrison, a printer, a Temperance Editor — Associates with Benjamin Lundy 
at Baltimore, 1829 — Imprisonment, trial, and release, 1830 — Established his "Lib- 
erator" at Boston, 1831 — Panic caused by insurrection in Virginia — New England 
Anti-Slavery Society formed, 1832 — Other Journals — Anti-Slavery tracts issued by 
Messrs. Tappan and others, New York — N. Y. Emancipator commenced, 1833 — 
Miss Crandall's School, Connecticut — N. Y. City A. S. Soc. organized, Oct., 1833 
— American A. S. Soc. at Philadelphia, Dec, 1833 — Principles and measures of 
Abolitionists. 

If the reader of the preceding chapters shall have suffi- 
ciently pondered the character of American slavery, and the 
position of the churches and of the Federal Government in 
respect to it, he will now perhaps be able to form some intel- 
ligent opinion concerning the condition and prospects of 
liberty in America, at the time when the present agitation of 
the slave question commenced. He will be able to judge 
whether such an' agitation then was unnecessary, impertinent, 
ill-judged, unfortunate, or ill-timed. And when he learns, in 
the perusal of this chapter, the principles, the aims, and the 
measures of the abolitionists, he may be ready to judge whe- 
ther, or how far, they offended against the rules of decorum 
and prudence; and whether the opposition they encountered 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 383 

was anything more than might have been expected from the 
leading men, and the controlling influences, in Church and 
State, that have already been described, however wise and 
prudent may have been the persons earnestly and resolutely 
engaged in the effort against slavery. 

It is not easy, perhaps not possible, to trace all the latent 
causes which, like little rivulets running together, produced 
the present agitation of the slave question, as other popular 
agitations are produced. We shall mention such as are 
within our knowledge, without pretending to enumerate 
them all. 

The year 1820, after a long period of quiet, was distin- 
guished by a pretty general and earnest discussion of slavery, 
growing out of the debates in Congress concerning the admis- 
sion of Missouri, and the adjustment of that controversy by 
the Missouri Compromise. Mr. Clay, the author of that mea- 
sure, and those who co-operated with him, congratulated 
themselves with the success of the policy. As lately as 
1850, Mr. Clay alluded to it in the Senate, while his "omni- 
bus" compromise was pending, reminding senators of its suc- 
cess, and boastfully assuring them that his second compromise 
would be equally efficacious in allaying the popular ferment, 
and restoring peace. 

It is undoubtedly true that the Missouri Compromise, like 
all other compromises between right and wrong, did induce a 
moral paralysis in those who assented to it, and this is what 
Mr. Clay denominates peace. But the people did not all hold 
themselves parties to that compromise, nor participate in its 
benumbing effects. The spark of liberty was a fire pent up 
in their bones. Though temporarily baffled, they were not 
conquered. If the national "Vesuvius was capped" for a few 
years, it was only that it might burst forth again with fresh 
vigor. If Henry Clay could but have known how many 
were made uncompromising abolitionists by their disgust with 
that unholy compromise, he would have found less occasion 
to congratulate himself with the results. The present anti- 
slavery excitement may be distinctly traced, in part, to the 



384 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN" 

earnest debates among the people elicited by that same Mis- 
souri Compromise. The ''settlement" of the question by 
Congress was only the signal for its agitation among their 
constituents. 

The Congressional elections of 1820 were extensively 
affected by the previous votes of the Representatives on the 
admission of Missouri. The recreants to liberty were regarded 
as marked men, especially those who had falsified their own 
previous professions, and richly merited the expressive epi- 
thet, "dough-faces,"* then coined and bestowed upon them 
by the eccentric John Randolph, of Roanoke. In some 
instances they took the hint of their friends, and quietly 
withdrew from public life. In other cases, their old asso- 
ciates declined to nominate them. Some were nominated, 
only to be defeated. Others, who had previously defied all 
competitors, were subjected to the mortification of being 
re-elected by a diminished vote, barely escaping defeat, after 
the most strenuous exertions of their supporters, admonishing 
them never to hazard the chances again. 

This latter was the fate of the very distinguished and 
highly-gifted Representative from Rhode Island.f The con- 
troversy was carried on during the whole summer by news- 
paper discussions, and public meetings, and debates. Party 
tactics and party discipline were resorted to, with little effect ; 
party lines, for the time being, were well nigh erased, and the 
terms "anti-slavery" and "pro-slavery" took the place of 
Federalist and Republican. The files of newspapers, particu- 
larly the Providence Gazette,^ bear testimony that the discus- 

* This term, as now commonly used and understood, expressively characterizes 
the politician, whose face, as flexible as " dough," and belonging to a head equally 
soft, may be moulded by others into any shape that best suits them. But it is 
thought by some that the epithet intended by Mr. Randolph was " doe-faces," in 
allusion to the timidity of the female deer, who attempts to drink, but starts back 
at the reflection of its own face in the water. " They saw," said he, " their own doe- 
faces, and were frightened." 

t The late Hon. Samuel Eddy, of Providence. Mr. Hazard, his associate, a le3s 
popular candidate, was dropped from the ticket, on election day, by his own 
partisans. 

X The Providence Gazette was a Federal paper. Mr. Eddy was supported by the 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 385 

sion became as " radical" then, as it is now, and that nearly 
the same arguments, pro and con., were then in use. Some 
who commenced writing against slavery and " compromise," 
then, have not ceased writing against them still. The author 
may be permitted to record himself among these. Mr. Eddy 
was elected by a majority of less than one hundred votes. 

The anti-slavery agitation of 1820 was not confined to 
Rhode Island, or even to New England. It extended 
throughout the non-slavcholding States. By many of the 
" Friends " and other opponents of slavery, the " Missouri 
Compromise " was unsparingly condemned ; but the deed was 
done, and there seemed no political remedy at hand, but the 
political repudiation of the authors, which, very extensively, 
took effect. To this day, we find, in various parts of the 
country, a remnant of the anti-slavery agitators of that period, 
and recognize some of the old familiar names in the proceedings 
of the Anti-slavery and Free Soil conventions of the present 
times. The late Benjamin Lundy was probably moved by 
the Missouri contest and compromise, to engage in his arduous 
anti-slavery labors. He seems to have entered the field that 
same year, and commenced the publication of his monthly 
periodical, the " Genius of Universal Emancipation," the year 
following, 1821. In an appeal to the public in April, 1830, 
he says : 

" I have, within the period above mentioned, (ten years,) sacrificed seve- 
ral thousand dollars of my own hard earnings, have travelled upwards of five 
thousand miles on foot, and more than twenty thousand in other ways ; have 
visited nineteen States of this Union, and held more than two hundred pub- 
lic meetings — have performed two voyages to the West Indies, by which. 
means the liberation of a considerable number of slaves has been effected, 
and, I hope, the way paved for the enlargement of many more." 

At Philadelphia, at Baltimore, at Washington City, he suc- 
cessively published his paper. In 1828, while located at Bal- 



Dcmocratic papers, as being the nominee of that party. Until his obnoxious voto 
in Congress, he was so acceptable to both parties, that no opposing nomination was 
made against him. But now he was deserted by the " rank and file" of both parties,, 
to a great extent. 

25 



386 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

timore, lie visited various parts of New England, to extend 
the circulation of his paper, and stir up the friends of the en- 
slaved. He visited Texas twice, and penetrated into Mexico, 
in search of some better asylum for fugitive and emancipated 
slaves. Though failing to accomplish this object, he possessed 
himself of much invaluable information, which afterwards be- 
came of the highest importance to the cause in which he was 
engaged, and to the country at large. It was chiefly to com- 
munications from Benjamin Lundy that John Quincy Adams 
was indebted for those astounding disclosures concerning the 
Texas plot with which he so suddenly electrified Congress 
and the nation, in 1836. A more full account of the particu- 
lars was afterwards published by Mr. Lundy himself in a 
paper issued at Philadelphia for that purpose. This timely 
information put the friends of liberty upon the track by which, 
though failing to exclude Texas from the Union, they have 
succeeded, thus far, in arresting the quiet march of the slave 
power to the Pacific, thus sending a thrill of alarm and rage 
through the whole South. Thus does Divine Providence 
raise up and direct the voluntary instruments of its high de- 
signs. Benjamin Lundy was a member of the Society of 
Friends ; he was small in stature, of feeble health, afflicted 
with deafness, less definite than some abolitionists in his anti- 
slavery ethics and measures, but of indomitable purpose, per- 
severance, faith, courage, patience, self-denial, endurance, and 
by dint of these, became a pioneer in the cause. At one time 
he traversed the free States, lecturing, collecting, obtaining 
subscribers, writing for his paper, getting it printed, monthly, 
wherever he could conveniently have it printed, for once, 
stopping himself to read the "proof," and direct and mail his 
papers, then travelling on again another month, and carrying 
in his trunk his "direction book," "column rules," and type 
" heading," (with the date of " Baltimore,"") to facilitate the 
process. Such are the labors of men who commence moral 
revolutions, to be completed by others after they have gone 
off the stage. 

Among the early pioneers of the cause, should be mentioned 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 387 

the name of Rev. John Rankin, a Presbyterian minister of 
Kentucky, now of Ripley, Ohio. In 1824 or 1825, he publish- 
ed his Letters on Slavery, maintaining its inherent sinfulness, 
and enforcing the duty of its present abandonment. Through 
his influence an anti-slavery society, on the same principle, 
was formed in Kentucky, at that early period. It was after- 
wards, however, " laid asleep " (to use the words of Mr. Ran- 
kin,) by the illusive pretensions and seductive influences of 
the Colonization Society. 

There were moral, religious, and social influences at work, 
preparatory to an unprecedented agitation of the slave ques- 
tion. The missionary enterprise, in its youthful vigor, was 
an effort for "evangelizing the world." It was deliberately 
proposed as a work to be done. It was based on a belief that 
the promises and predictions of the Scriptures afforded a di- 
vine guaranty for its accomplishment. Bible, Tract, and Edu- 
cation Societies were commended and patronized as auxiliaries 
to this magnificent undertaking. The anniversaries of these 
were enlivened with glowing descriptions of the approaching 
millennium, when all should know the Lord, from the least to 
the greatest, and sit under their own vines and fig-trees, secure 
in their rights. The eloquence of a Beecher, a Rice, a Corne- 
lius, a Summerfield, and a Spring, on such occasions, had sent 
a thrill through the churches, and the promised day was be- 
lieved to have already dawned. The time was set for furnish- 
ing every family on the earth with Bibles. The chronology 
of the prophetic periods was computed, and the close of the 
present century, it was believed, was to witness the completed 
work of the " conversion of the world." To be " up and do- 
ino- " was the watchword, and our American love of liberty, 
equality, and "free institutions," was gratified with the assu- 
rance that all the despotisms of the earth were to crumble at 
the Prince Emanuel's approach ! 

Was all this to be accomplished without Bibles, and educa- 
tion, and marriage, and family sanctities, and liberation for 
American slaves? Who could believe it? Whatever our 
missionary and evangelizing orators intended, whatever they 



388 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

were thinking of, they were God's instruments for putting 
into the minds of others "thoughts that burned," for the 
emancipation of the enslaved. The writer and many others 
well remember that the tone of our May anniversaries of reli- 
gious societies, from 1825 to 1832, was such as has been de- 
scribed. And the suddenness with which this tone was 
changed, when bibles, education, and family sanctities were 
demanded for slaves, did not escape notice. But the fires 
kindled could not be extinguished. 

The same period was distinguished by " revivals of reli- 
gion," in which prominence was given to the old doctrine 
of Hopkins and Edwards, demanding " immediate and uncon- 
ditional repentance " of all sin, as the only condition of for- 
giveness and salvation. This was urged in direct opposition 
to the vague idea of a gradual amendment, admitting " a more 
convenient season" — a prospective, dilatory, indefinite break- 
ing off from transgression--an idea that had been settling 
upon the churches for thirty or forty years previous, — an in- 
cubus upon every righteous cause, and every holy endeavor. 
It is easy to see the bearing of such religious awakenings upon 
the mode of treating the practice of slaveholding, unless it 
were believed to be righteous. A more perfect antagonism 
to the ethics and operations of the Colonization Society could 
not well be imagined. A collision was inevitable, whenever 
the subject should be introduced, and the Society itself could 
scarcely avoid introducing it. 

Simultaneously with all this, and more or less connected 
with it, there came over the religious community an increas- 
ing spirit of inquiry in respect to Christian ethics, and the 
bearing of the religious principle upon the social relations and 
political duties of man. Peace Societies had been formed. 
Temperance Societies were in progress. The Institution of 
Free Masonry had been arraigned. The influence of theatres, 
of lotteries, and the morality of lottery grants by legislatures, 
were brought under rigorous review. The treatment of the 
aborigines of our country, especially of the Cherokees, by 
Georgia and the Federal Government, and the imprisonment 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 389 

of the missionaries among the Cherokccs, became subjects of 
earnest attention. Christians began to be reminded that they 
were citizens, and that Christianity had its claims upon them 
in their civil relations. The Sabbath Mail question — whether 
wisely or unwisely managed — became an exciting topic of 
aui mad version from the pulpit and religious press. The ap- 
plication of the principle may have been a mistaken one, or it 
may have been unhappily argued and urged ; but the princi- 
ple was, in some fashion, brought into view, that though our 
institutions secure religious freedom, 3 r et religion and politics 
are in some way connected, after all, and civil Governments 
have no right to disobey God. In short, it was a period of 
unwonted if not unprecedented moral and political inquiry. 
Was it possible that the slave question should escape the 
scrutiny of such an age ? Assuredly it did not, and for the 
obvious reason that there was in progress a new and strong 
development of the human mind in the direction of such in- 
vestigations. How short-sighted are those who think that the 
agitation originated only with a few " fanatics," and that all 
would be quiet if they could be silenced or crushed ! 

Along with the new spirit of moral enterprise and inquiry, 
there came likewise the new and appropriate methods of their 
manifestation and culture among the masses of the people. 
Newspapers were no longer confined to party politics and 
commerce, nor the reading of them to the select few. Reli- 
gious newspapers were among the novelties of the times. 
These were followed by papers designed to promote the re- 
forms and discuss the moral questions of the day. Voluntary 
lecturers and agents of societies were abroad. Promiscuous 
conventions as well as protracted religious meetings were 
held, and laymen found they had tongues. To write for the 
public was no longer the monopoly of professional authors 
and quarterly and monthly reviewers. "Whoever pleased 
might become an editor of a newspaper, and whoever chose 
to subscribe for it, at a trifling expense, was introduced into 
the " republic of letters." Not only did the great masses 
become readers of public journals, but to a great and grow- 



390 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

rag extent, contributors, likewise. The custom of writing 
anonymously, encouraged the timid : the most dependent 
could stand here on a level with the most powerful, and 
sometimes smile to see their productions arrest the public 
attention. Farmers and mechanics, journeymen and appren- 
tices, merchants and clerks — females as well as males — par- 
ticipated in the privilege. From the counting-house, from 
the anvil, from the loom, from the farm-yard, from the parlor, 
perhaps from the kitchen, there came paragraphs for the pe- 
rusal (perhaps for the reproval and instruction) of Senators 
and Doctors of the Law. History, that often busies itself 
with petty details pertaining to those who have been falsely 
called great, need not count it undignified to notice revolu- 
tions in human condition like these — revolutions more sub- 
lime than those that transfer from one dynasty to another, 
princely crowns. No one can comprehend, in their causes 
and distinctive characteristics, the existing agitations in Ame- 
rica, who does not take into account the new power and the 
changed direction of the public press, constituting a new era 
in human history. 

Was it strange, at such a period, when laborers of almost 
all classes were giving free utterance to their thoughts, that 
the morality of unpaid and forced labor began to be ques- 
tioned — that the chivalry of whipping women, and the civili- 
zation of selling babes at auction by the pound — began to be 
scrutinized ? The rail-car, in 1838, the electric telegraph ten 
years afterwards, were scarcely greater innovations or greater 
curiosities than were voluntary lecturers, free public conven- 
tions, and moral and religious weekly journals, with their free 
correspondence, from 1825 to 1830. Was nothing, then, to 
have been expected — is nothing now to be attributed to this 
new moral and educating power ? 

William Lloyd Garrison was a printer's apprentice — 
then a journeyman printer, at Newburyport, Massachusetts. 
He wrote paragraphs, perhaps stanzas, for the newspaper, on 
the printing of which he was employed. His pieces were 
copied. He became known. He was invited, in 1827 or '28, 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 391 

to edit, for a few months (perhaps to assist also in printing), 
a weekly paper in Boston, the only one then devoted exclu- 
sively to the Temperance cause, the first of the kind ever 
attempted, and then in its second or third year.* lie after- 
wards edited, by invitation, for a short period, the "Journal 
of the Times" in Vermont, and took strong ground against 
slavery. 

In the autumn of 1829 he became associated with Benjamin 
Lundy, in the publishing and editing the " Genius of Univer- 
sal Emancipation" at Baltimore. Not long afterwards, the 
ship Francis, belonging to Francis Todd, of Newburyport, 
Mass., being at Baltimore for freight, was employed in taking 
from thence a cargo of slaves for New Orleans. Mr. Garrison 
noticed the fact in his paper, and spoke of it in terms of such 
severity that Mr. Todd directed a suit to be brought against 
him for a libel. He was tried by a Maryland Court, in Feb., 
1830, convicted, and thrown into jail for non-payment of the 
fine (one hundred dollars) and costs. This circumstance 
roused an excitement at the North that has never since 
slept.f From that time the anti-slavery cause took its place 
among the moral enterprises of the age ; small indeed in the 
beginning, and for sometime after, but constantly widening 
and deepening its channels. 



* The National Philanthropist, commenced in 1326, by the late Rev. William 
Collier (a Baptist), by whom Mr. Garrison was employed. The Investigator, by 
William Goodell, commenced in 1827, and published at Providence, R. I., was de- 
voted to moral and political discussion, and reformation in general, including tem- 
perance and anti-slavery. In Jan., 1829, it was merged by him in the National 
Philanthropist, at Boston, Mr. Collier retiring. In July, 1S30, it was removed to 
New York, and published as " The Genius of Temperance,'''' by W. Goodell and P. 
CranJall — afterwards by W. Goodell, till the close of 1833, when it was discontinued, 
and W. Goodell took charge of the Emancipator, which had been issued by him 
from the same office, though in the name and by the aid of Rev. C. W. Denisou, 
from the spring preceding. In conducting both these papers he received assistance, 
for a season, from the late Stephen P. Ilines, one of the earliest advocates of the 
anti-slavery cause. 

t By the popular orators and paid agents of the Colonization Society, Mr. Garrison 
was afterwards stigmatized in public meetings of that Society, in the city of New 
York and elsewhere, as " a convicted felon," on account of this trial and imprison- 
ment ! 



392 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

After lying in jail about fifty daj^s, Mr. Garrison was 
released by the payment of his fine and costs, amounting to 
upwards of one hundred and fifty dollars, contributed chiefly 
by Mr. Arthur Tappan, merchant, of New York, well known 
as the munificent patron of Foreign Missions and other kin- 
dred efforts. His name thenceforward, with that of his bro- 
ther, Lewis Tappan, was identified with the anti-slavery cause. 
Mr. Garrison, dissolving partnership with Mr. Lundy, issued 
the prospectus of his " Liberator" to be published at Wash- 
ington City, but his arrangements were afterwards changed. 
Mr. Lundy removed with his paper to Washington, and Mr. 
Garrison commenced his "Liberator" in Boston, in Jan., 1831. 

Mr. Tappan, Rev. Simeon S. Jocelyn, and others, projected 
the establishment of a seminary of learning at New Haven, 
for the benefit of colored students, the same year, but a strong 
opposition manifested itself, a public meeting at New Haven 
denounced the project, and it was necessarily abandoned. 

The insurrection of Nat. Turner at Southampton, in Vir- 
ginia, the same year, alarmed the South, and quickened the 
discussion of the slave question throughout the country. The 
insurgents, about sixty in number, were put down by United 
States' forces. The Legislature of Virginia discussed the 
measure of gradual emancipation, but indefinitely postponed 
the whole subject. 

On January 30, 1832, the New England Anti-Slavery 
Society was organized in Boston, and went into operation, 
but with limited means. 

The " New York Evangelist" conducted for a time by Eev. 
Samuel Griswold, and afterwards by Eev. Joshua Leavitt, 
entered into the discussion, and espoused the enterprise. The 
" Genius of Temperance," as before mentioned, was already 
committed to the cause. The circulation of both these papers 
was, at that time, extensive, through all the non-slaveholding 
and many of the slaveholding States. 

By pecuniary aid from the Messrs. Tappan, the "Emanci- 
pator" was commenced, in the spring of 1833, as before stated, 
by the publishers of the " Genius of Temperance." 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 393 

By co-operation between the Messrs. Tappan and a few 
others, very large issues of anti-slavery tracts were circulated 
monthly, during the greater part of this year, and sent by 
mail to clergymen of all denominations, and other prominent 
men throughout the country. A great amount of important 
information was thus diffused. 

This year was also distinguished by the visit of Mr. Garri- 
son to England, where he obtained important infornTation, 
and was cheered with the hearty sympathy of Wilberforce, 
Clarkson, Buxton, Macauley, and other friends of the cause. 
At home, the excitement was increased by the disgraceful and 
ever memorable prosecution and imprisonment of Miss Pru- 
dence Crandall, for teaching a colored school at Canterbury, 
Conn., under a law enacted for the special purpose, through 
the influence of leading friends of the Colonization Society. 

By this time the doctrine of immediate and unconditional 
emancipation of the soil, as held by •" modern abolitionists," 
was pretty thoroughly proclaimed throughout the country. 
To the mass of the people it was a new and strange doc- 
trine, though taught by Hopkins and Edv/ards the previous 
century. It roused the people from their slumbers. The 
majority were alarmed; some hesitated, many inquired, and 
not a few, including individuals of high moral worth and 
established reputation, were attracted to the new and defi- 
nite standard, and rallied round it. Among these were 
many whose earnest opposition to slavery was no new and 
hasty impulse. Evan Lewis, of Pennsylvania, of the Society 
of Friends, for many years an active friend of the enslaved, 
was of the number of these. Hon. William Jay, the worthy 
son of Gov. John Jay of* New York, was another. Moses 
Brown, a very aged member of the Society of Friends, of 
Providence, K. I., more extensively known by his exalted 
virtues and rare wisdom than by his great wealth, was an- 
other.* Nathaniel Emmons, D.D., of Massachusetts, the dis- 



* Moses Brown died in 1836, aged 98. A few days before his death he penned an 
important communication on the subject of slavery, for publication iu an anti-slavery 



394 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

languished theologian, of the school of Edwards and Hopkins, 
and formerly their associate, being then eighty-eight years of 
age, but retaining his full mental vigor, was another.* Eev. 
Thomas Andros, of Berkeley, Mass., upwards of seventy 
years of age, yet active, a "self-made man" — of strong powers 
and extensive literary acquirements, a theological writer, 
though a mariner in his younger years, and once a prisoner 
in the* Revolutionary war on board the far-famed Jersey 
prison-ship, (from which he escaped by almost superhuman 
exertions and miraculous providences, while prostrate with 
yellow fever,) was another. Chief Justice Hutchinson, of 
Vermont, was another. To this list might be added others 
less extensively known, but of a similar character, men 
minutely acquainted with the history of slavery and emanci- 
pation, veterans, some of them, for more than half a century 
in the cause of human freedom, and well qualified to judge 
what expedients were to be regarded as inadequate, and what 
the exigencies of the times required. The wisdom and expe- 
rience of such men should have sheltered the anti-slavery 
agitation from the flippant charge of a "hair-brained fanati- 
cism" — the charges emanating, in most instances, from younger 
and less considerate men, many of whom had never devoted 
a month's candid attention to the most profound and moment- 
ous problem of the age. If younger men, under the manifest 
Providence of God, originated the movement, they were not 
destitute of the sympathy, council, and co-operation of the 

paper. He was consequently 94 years of age in 1832, when the New England Anti- 
Slavery Society was formed. 

* Dr. Emmons had incautiously taken for granted that the Colonization Society 
was doing some good, though he never seems to have relied upon it to remove slavery. 
When Mr. Garrison came out against the Society, in 1832, Dr. Emmons, who was 
" never too old to learn, 1 ' sat down to an examination of the Society's periodical 
magazine, the " African Repository" which was lying on a shelf in his own study. 
A few hours' reading opened his eyes. " There is no disinterested benevolence 
about it," said he, as he laid up the numbers. " It is all a scheme of selfishness, 
from beginning to end. It is all wrong." At the Anniversary of the American 
Anti-Slavery Society in Newi T ork City, in May, 1835, he was present, and presided 
at the opening of the meeting for business. He died Sept. 23, 1840, in the 96th year 
of his age. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 395 

patriarchs of liberty in both hemispheres. And practical 
business men, from forty to sixty years of age, were not want- 
ing among them. New recruits, of all ages and professions, 
came forward. President Storrs, and Professors B. Green* 
and E. Wright, Jr., of the Western Reserve College, Hudson, 
Ohio, were hailed among the accessions of this period. [James 
G. Birney, James A. Thome, Eev. Dr. Nelson, Rev. Dr. Bris- 
bane and others, from the slave States, espoused the cause 
afterwards.] 

The time had now come for a more general organization of 
the friends of the cause. A New York City Anti-Slavery 
Society was organized, October 2, 1833, but not without de- 
monstrations of tumult and violence. The meeting had been 
advertised to be held at Clinton Hall. A counter notice, 
signed by " Many Southrons," invited a meeting at the same 
time and place. The abolitionists, therefore, as many as on 
the sudden emergency could be notified, assembled at Chatham 
Street Chapel. Their opposers, |inding Clinton Hall closed, 
adjourned to Tammany Hall, and made speeches and adopted 
resolutions against them. Before separating, the}'" learned 
where the abolitionists were assembled, and adjourned, by ac- 
clamation, and shouts of " Let us route them," to Chatham 
Street Chapel, which they entered tumultuously and riotously, 
just as the meeting there had adjourned, but before the per- 
sons in attendance had left the house. Loud threats were 
uttered — " Ten thousand dollars for Arthur Tappan !" Several 
abolitionists were called for by name, but they all escaped 
personal violence. The Tammany meeting was organized by 
prominent citizens, addressed by popular public speakers, and 
their proceedings published in the city papers, along with 
gratulations for the " security of the Union !" 

By the same class of citizens, a Colonization meeting was 
promptly called, which was held at the Masonic Hall, precisely 
one week after the Tammany Hall and Chatham Street Chapel 
meetings. The Mayor of the city presided. The orators 



* Afterwards President Green, of Oneida Institute, N. Y. 



396 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

dwelt on the reckless agitations of the abolitionists. Not a 
word of disapprobation of the late outrage against them was 
uttered. Theodore Frelinghuysen, United States Senator from 
New Jersey, charged them with " seeking to dissolve the 
Union." Chancellor Walworth was in attendance, from Al- 
bany, to declare their efforts " unconstitutional," and to de- 
nounce them as "reckless incendiaries." David B. Ogden, 
Esq., declared " the doctrine of immediate emancipation to be 
a direct and palpable nullification of the Constitution." Mr. 
Frelinghuysen further declared that "nine-tenths of the hor- 
rors of slavery are imaginary," and the "crusade of abolition" 
he regarded as "the poetry of philanthropy." 

In pursuance of a previous public notice, a National Anti- 
Slavery Convention was held in the City of Philadelphia, 
December 4th, 5th, and 6th, 1833, consisting of upwards of 
sixty members, from ten States, viz. : Maine, New Hampshire, 
Vermont, Massachusetts, Ehode Island, Connecticut, New 
York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Ohio. Beriah Green, 
President of Oneida Institute, was chosen President of the 
Convention, and Lewis Tappan and John G. Whittier Secre- 
taries. The members united in signing a declaration of their 
sentiments, objects, and measures, prepared in committee, 
from a draft by Mr. Garrison. This Convention organized 
the American Anti-Slavery Society, of which Arthur Tappan 
was chosen President, Elizur Wright, Jun., Secretary of Do- 
mestic Correspondence, and William Lloyd Garrison Secretary 
of Foreign Correspondence, A. L. Cox, Eecording Secretary, 
William Green, Jr., Treasurer. The Executive Committee 
was located in New York City, the seat of the Society's oper- 
ations ; which were now prosecuted with vigor. The " Eman- 
cipator," under editorial charge of William Goodell,* one of 
the Executive Committee, became the organ of the Society. 
Tracts, pamphlets, and books were published and circulated, 

* This arrangement continued till July, 1835, -when Mr. Goodell left the city for 
another field of labor in the same cause, and the Emancipator was conducted, suc- 
cessively, by E. Wright, Jr., Amos A. Phelps, and Joshua Leavitt, and was finally 
removed to Boston. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 397 

a large number of lecturing agents were employed, conven- 
tions were held, and State, County, and local Anti-Slavery 
Societies were organized throughout the free States, auxiliary 
to the American, and contributing to its funds. The New 
England Anti-Slavery Society became the Massachusetts State 
Society. Mr. Garrison continued to issue the Liberator at 
Boston, some time as organ of the State Society, and after- 
wards again in his own name. 

These particulars may serve to give some idea of the origin 
of the Anti-Slavery movement, sufficient to show that it was 
of no mushroom growth, or capricious origin, but came up, 
naturally, not to say necessarily, under the moral government 
of God, and in the onward and upward march of human im- 
provement and progress. In the light of the preceding his- 
tory, this remark can scarcely fail to be appreciated, as well 
as understood. To what destiny, without such a healthful, 
'timely, and necessary agitation, could the country have been 
tending? What would have become of the interests of hu- 
manity, of morality, of religion, of civilization, and of liberty, 
affected as these are by the position and the activities of the 
.Church and of the State? Was it not high time that some- 
tiling were attempted to be done ? What should that some- 
'thing be, if not the measures that were then put in operation? 
If there were wiser men, who could have propounded better 
measures, why did they not come forward ? If it be said 
that the Colonization Society was, (as was claimed by its 
friends,) that better measure, let the unprejudiced reader 

We cannot further pursue, in minute detail, the history of 
the anti-slavery agitation. A well-digested and condensed 
^account of it would require a large volume. We will hastily 
group together a few classes of facts that may afford light upon 
the present position and aspect of the slave question in Amer- 
ica, and the duties and prospects before us. 



398 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 



PRINCIPLES OF ABOLITIONISTS. 



These may be briefly and comprehensively stated as fol- 
lows: 

"All men are created equal, and are endowed by their 
Creator with certain inalienable rights, among which are life, 
liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." 

Slavery, or more properly, the practice of slaveholding, is 
a crime against human nature, and a sin against God. 

Like all other sins, it should be immediately and uncondi-i 
tionally repented of, and abandoned. It is always safe to 
leave off doing wrong, and never safe to continue in wrong- 
doing. 

It is the duty of all men to bear testimony against wrong- 
doing, and consequently, to bear testimony against slavehold- 
ing. 

Immediate and unconditional emancipation is pre-eminently 
prudent, safe, and beneficial, to all the parties concerned.* 

No compensation is due to the slaveholder for emancipating 
his slaves ; and emancipation creates no necessity for such 
compensation, because it is, of itself, a pecuniary benefit, not 
only to the slave, but to the master. 

There should be no compromise of moral principle, in legis- 
lation, jurisprudence, or the executive action of the Govern- 
ment, any more than in the activities and responsibilities of 
private life. 

No wicked enactments can be morally binding. " There 
are, at the present time, the highest obligations resting on the 
people of the free states to remove slavery, by moral and po- 
litical action, as prescribed in the Constitution of the United 
States." — Anti-Slavery Declaration of 1833. 

The measures of abolitionists were such as grew out 

* The precise date of the adoption of this sentiment by " modern abolitionists" 
generally in America, we do not find. Mr. Garrison had not adopted it at the time 
of his 4th of July discourse at Boston, in 1829, but it was embodied in the Declara- 
tion of the Convention at Philadelphia, in 1833. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 399 

of their princijrtes, and consisted in their promulgation and 
practice. 

Among the publications circulated by them, at an early 
day, were the Dialogue of Dr. Hopkins, and the Sermon of 
Dr. Jonathan Edwards, before mentioned, together with Wes- 
ley's Thoughts on Slavery. The first two, as we have seen, 
had been circulated long before, by the Anti-Slavery Societies, 
patronized by Stiles, Jay, and Franklin. The latter had been 
circulated by Methodist preachers, by direction of the Con- 
ferences, as late as the year 1804. But in 1834, the circula- 
tion of these writings was proscribed as treasonable, and 
condemned as insurrectionary. No writings of "modern 
abolitionists" were more severe against slaveholders than 
these, as an examination of them will show. 



400 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 



CHAPTER XXXIII. 

OPPOSITION TO ABOLITIONISTS. — ITS CAUSES — ITS ELEMENTS — 
ITS NATURE AND METHODS. 

Why abolitionists were opposed — False reasons assigned for it — Elements of the 
opposition — Conservatism in the Church — Commercial cupidity — Political rivalry 
— Scheme of Colonization — Servility of Literary Institutions — Nature and modes 
of opposition — The religious and political press— Mob violence — Early and remark- 
able instances— New York, Philadelphia, Worcester (Mass.), Canaan (N. II.), 
Boston, Utica (N. Y.), New Haven (Conn.), Alton (111.)— Murder of Loveji 
Burning of Pennsylvania Hall — Three Riots in Cincinnati — Three in Philadel- 
phia — Similar scenes elsewhere — Fomented by " the higher classes of Soeiety"- 
" Gentlemen of property and standing" — the Conservative Clergy, and leading 
influences in the Colonization Society. 

Why were abolitionists opposed ? And for what ? It was 
for the agitation of the slave question. It was for the at- 
tempted propagation and practice of their principles, and for 
nothing else* that abolitionists were violently assailed and vil- 
lified. 

It was not because they were "fanatics" or "incendiaries," 
nor because they insisted upon or recommended " amalgama- 
tion," or sought to incite the slaves to insurrection and blood- 
shed. These charges were only the unfounded aspersions of 
their enemies. 

It was not because they had any of them, at that time, as- 
sailed either the Churches, the Sabbath, the Bible, the Minis- 
try, the Constitution, the Union, or the political parties. They 



* It is admitted that many worthy men, including sincere friends of the enslaved, 
dissented from the distinctive views of abolitionists, and argued against them. Dr. 
Channing, to some extent, did this, as did many others. But this was no part of 
the kind of opposition of which we are speaking. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 401 

had simply assailed slavery, invoking all the powers of the 
Church and of the State, with their institutions — all religious 
sects and all political parties in the country — to join with 
them, in opposition to slavery. They were mostly themselves 
supporters of the different religious sects and political parties : 
ami so far from anticipating any separation from them, or con- 
troversy with them, they fondly expected to secure their co- 
operation and assistance. To ministers of the gospel, espe- 
cially, were their appeals confidingly and respectfully ad- 
dressed.* 

It was not because, in the first instance, they opposed, or 
thought of opposing, the Colonization Society. Mr. Garrison 
himself addressed, on invitation, a meeting of the Colonization 
Society, held in the Park-street Congregational Church in 
Boston, on the 4th of July, 1829.f The Colonization Society 
was not opposed by abolitionists until it was found to be the 
opposer of abolition, and the persecutor of the free people of 
color. 

It was the " agitation of the subject" that was opposed, and 
not any particular measure or mode of treating it. 

ELEMENTS OF THE OPPOSITION. 

As the anti-slavery agitation was, primarily, the natural 

* The writer accompanied Mr. Garrison, in 1S29, in calling upon a number of 
prominent ministers in Boston, to secure their co-operation in the cause. Our 
expectations of important assistance from them were, at that time, very sanguine. 

t This elaborate and able discourse was published in the National Philanthropist. 
under the title of " National Dangers," among which the speaker enumerated 
" infidelity" — " the tyranny of government which compels its servants to desecrate 
the holy Sabbath"' — the " desolations of liquid fire" — the abuse of the elective fran- 
chise — the general exclusion of religious men from office — " the profligacy of the 
press," which attacks every holy enterprise, (e. g. the missionary cause, &c., which 
was then villified), and finally, the great abomination of slavery. On this latter 
topic the speaker dilated at length, and said — " 1 call on the ambassadors of Christ 
everywhere, to make known this proclamation, 'Thus saitli the Lord God of the 
Africans, Let this people go, that they may serve me.' I ask them to ' proclaim 
liberty to the captive, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound.' " "J 
call on the churches of the living God TO LEAD in this great enterprise !" 

Had the churches and ministry responded, as they should have done, to this 
appeal, they would have been spared the trouble of opposing " infidel abolition- 
ism," and the pretext of being repulsed from the anti-slavery enterprise by it. 

26 



402 GKEAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

working of a religious sentiment in the religious community, 
so the opposition to it was, primarily, the natural working of 
a counter sentiment in the same religious community. There 
was not a religious sect that did not experience the shock of 
the two antagonistic principles contending against each other 
in the same ecclesiastical communion. 

From the times of the Edwardses, there had been a pro- 
gressive and a conservative party in the Churches ; the former 
aspiring after an enlarged liberty, and the latter seeking to 
repress it ; the former insisting upon the doctrine of imme- 
diate and unconditional repentance (as did Hopkins) ; the 
latter pleading for indulgences, postponement, gradualism, 
and temporizing expedients ; the former responded promptly 
to the call for the immediate and unconditional abolition of 
slavery ; the latter had previously intrenched and fortified 
itself in the fortress of the Colonization Society, and was de- 
termined to permit no disturbance of its supremacy and its 
quietude. 

The first collision, therefore, was manifested in the bosom 
of the principal religious sects at the North, including espe 
cially the Congregationalists of New England, and the Pres 
byterians of the Middle States, and speedily followed in the 
Methodist, Baptist, and other communions. The religious 
presses of these, particularly of the Congregational sect, in 
the hands of the conservative party, were the first to traduce, 
to misrepresent, to villify, and to oppose the abolitionists, 
representing them as anarchists, Jacobins, villifiers of great 
and good men who had been slaveholders, (but who had not 
been directly mentioned by abolitionists*) incendiaries, plot- 

* The Vermont Chronicle, edited by Eev. Joseph Tracy, early in 1833, represented 
that the Liberator had called Washington a man-stealer and a robber, now in hell I 
But this was only the inference of Mr. Tracy from a communication in the Liberator, 
written by a Presbyterian clergyman of New York (Rev. Geo. Bourne), formerly a 
resident of Virginia, in which the doctrine of Edwards— and in nearly the same Ian- 
guaffe—v/as, affirmed (without any allusion to Washington), that slaveholding was 
man-stealing, and an act of robbery. Yet the charge went the rounds of the reli- 
gious papers, was copied at the South, then by the New York City editors, and 
repeated by the mob who sacked the house, and burnt the furniture of Lewis Tappan 






SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 403 

ters of insurrection and disunion, and enemies of the public 
peace. By these artful and injurious appeals, other than re- 
ligious elements of opposition were soon roused. 

Commercial cupidity in the cities trading with the South, 
was one of these elements, very early brought into action. 

Political corruption and rivalry came next in order. Abo- 
litionists were found in both political parties. The leading 
whig presses first,* and the democratic afterwards, exerted 
themselves to throw off the imputed contamination, and as- 
sure the South that their party was "sound to the core, on 
the subject of slavery." 

All these elements of opposition found their centre, their 
home and their manifestation, from the beginning, in the 
Colonization Society, the pet of the conservatists both in the 
Church and the State. The meetings, the publications, the 
agents, and the advocates of this Society, were almost uni- 
formly and invariably at the head of every movement and of 
every disturbance in which the abolitionists were assailed. 

Literary Institutions at the North desiring or enjoying 
Southern patronage, Northern watering-places the resort of 
Southern visitors, manufacturing establishments and villages 
of artizans and mechanics vending their fabrics and wares at 
the South — these were points from which an influence was 
almost certain to emanate, opposed to all earnest agitation of 
the subject of slavery. 

Over all these elements and posts of opposition, presided 
the slave interest itself, the power that controlled so extensively 
both the Church and the State ; the mammoth oligarchy of 
the nation, assimilating and wielding for its own ends, all the 
minor interests and elements of aristocracy in the land. 



in the streets, in July, 1S34. Mr. Tracy would not retract the charge. He was 
afterwards editor of the Boston Recorder, and then of the New York Observer, the 

' two oldest religious papers in the country, and advocates of the Colonization 
Society. 

* This priority of action was perhaps owing to the fact that a greater number of 
prominent abolitionists were then found in the Whig party than in the Democratic, 
which latter was in the ascendant, and therefore i den tilled with the pro-slavery 

; action of the Government, and averse to agitation. 



404 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 



NATURE AND METHODS OF OPPOSITION. 

To " put down the discussion " — to " silence the agitation," 
was the evident object — and to a great extent, this design was 
openly avowed. The "public indignation," in some form, 
was to overawe the agitators, and overwhelm them with de- 
feat.* In perfect consistency with this, was the policy of clo- 
sing against them the ordinary avenues of access to the public 
mind — the pulpit, the forum, the public journals, (political, 
commercial, literary, and religious,) — the arena of public de- 
bate. Or, if a discussion was attempted, inflammatory ap- 
peals and injurious aspersions were substituted for manly 
argument and dignified debate. A colonization meeting or 
anniversary was the precursor of a mob against the abolition- 
ists ; or, on the other hand, the riotous dispersion of an anti- 
slavery meeting prepared the minds of a sympathizing popu- 
lace, with their gifted orators, for a public demonstration in 
favor of the colonization enterprise, connected with bitter de- 
nunciations of abolitionists, and apologies or defenses of 
slaveholding. 

EXTENSIVE MANIFESTATIONS OF MOB VIOLENCE. 

An attempt to hold an anti-slavery meeting in the city of 
New York, on the 4th of July, 1834, Was made the occasion 
of a frightful and protracted riot. The meeting was broken 
up ; and for several successive days and evenings, the city 
was in possession of the rioters, who assaulted private dwel- 
lings and places of public worship, attempting and threatening 
personal violence upon abolitionists. Similar scenes were 
enacted in Philadelphia a few weeks afterwards. Extensive 
damages were done to the ]3rivate dwellings and public build- 
ing of the unoffending colored people who had been cruelly 

* It is important that the reader notices distinctly this statement, and watches the 
evidences of its truthfulness, as the narrative proceeds. Great efforts have been 
made to produce the impression that only some peculiar and offensive "measures" 
of abolitionists were opposed. The " measure" most obnoxious was the agitation 
and discussion of the subject. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 405 

maligned, and wantonly held up to public odium at a coloni 
zation meeting a short time previous. During these riots ; 
which were of several days' recurrence, many of the colored 
people were wounded, and some of them lost their lives. 
' These early examples of lawlessness, notoriously counte- 
nanced as they were by men of wealth and influence, excited 
by eloquent orators, and palliated afterwards by the public 
press, furnished precedents for similar outrages throughout 
the non-slaveholding states for a series of years. 

At "Worcester, Mass., Aug. 10, 1835, while lie v. Orange 
Scott was lecturing, a son of an Ex-Governor of the State, 
assisted by an Irishman, tore up his notes and offered him 
personal violence. 

On the same day, a mob at Canaan, (N. H.) demolished and 
dragged away an academy, because colored youth were ad- 
mitted to study there. 

At Boston, Oct. 21st., 1835, a mob of 5000 "gentlemen of 
property and standing," as the city editors called them, mobbed 
the Boston Female Anti-Slavery Society, dispersed them while 
the President was at prayer, and dragged Mr. Garrison through 
the streets with a rope about his body. He was roughly 
handled, threatened with tar and feathers, but finally con- 
ducted to the Mayor, who lodged him in jail till the next 
day, to save him from further violence. After an examina- 
tion, he was released from prison, but at the earnest entreaties 
of the city authorities, left Boston for a time. 

The same day, at Utica, N. Y., a committee of twenty-five 
prominent citizens, appointed at a public meeting, and headed 
by a member of Congress, broke up a meeting convened to 
form a New York State Anti-Slavery Society, and threw down 
the press of a democratic journal that had espoused the anti- 
slavery cause. By invitation of Gerrit Smith, who, on that 
occasion, identified himself with them, the abolitionists re- 
paired to his residence at Peterboro', twenty-five miles dis- 
tant, where the next day they finished the transaction of their 
business, after a portion of them had been pelted with stones, 



406 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

mud, and missiles, at Vernon, on their way from Utica to 
Peterboro'. 

In Dec. 1836, an anti-slavery meeting at New Haven, Conn., 
was broken up by some southern students of Yale College. 

At Alton, Illinois, Nov. 7, 1837, the press of the Alton 
Observer was destroyed by a mob, and the editor, Eev. Elijah 
P. Lovejoy, shot dead, receiving four balls in his breast. The 
murderers were not brought to justice. 

Pennsylvania Hall, in Philadelphia, was opened May 14, 
1838, for the. free discussion of all subjects interesting to 
American citizens. On the 17th of the same month it was 
burned by a mob, because abolitionists had been allowed to 
hold a meeting there. 

At Cincinnati, Ohio, Sept. 5, 1841, a ferocious mob de- 
stroyed, for the third time, the printing-press of the Philan- 
thropist, a paper devoted to anti-slavery. The first of these 
outrages was in 1836. James G. Birney, a repentant slave- 
holder, from Kentucky, was then editor and proprietor of the 
paper. 

At Philadelphia, on the 1st of August, 1842, occurred the 
worst of several mobs against the colored people of that city. 
A church and hall, built by their hard earnings, were burnt 
down, their houses demolished, and their persons beaten and 
mangled in the most ferocious and cowardly manner. The 
city authorities afforded no efficient protection till the mis- 
chief was done, in a riot of two days. The only provocation, 
on their part, was a peaceful temperance celebration of the 
anniversary of British West India emancipation, and walking 
in public procession on that occasion. 

These instances present but a specimen of the riots enacted 
against abolitionists in almost all parts of the country. Not 
only in cities and large towns, but in rural villages, and 
country parishes, and townships, the attempt to hold a meet- 
ing for the discussion of slavery was, very frequently, the 
signal for a disturbance and breach of the peace.* 



* It would be easy to fill a respectable volume with accounts of these mobs, and 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 407 

One uniform feature of these lawless proceedings lias been 
that they have been either countenanced, instigated, or pal- 
liated by that description of citizens who complacently con- 
sider themselves and arc commonly denominated "the higher 
class of society" — the men of wealth, of office, of literature, 
of elegant leisure, including politicians, — and that portion of 
the clergy who naturally associate with the class just de- 
scribed, or are dependent upon them. The aristocracy of a 
city or village, and its mobocracy, if not exactly identical, or 
even if exhibiting the strong contrasts of splendor and squalor, 
were found to be the inseparable ingredients, the sine qua non 
of a riot against the claims of emancipation and the exercise 
of free speech. We speak of the general fact, not forgetting 
the noble exceptions. 

Another remark in place here, is the uniformity and effi- 
ciencv with which the influences sustaining the scheme of 
Colonization, (with the rare exceptions just now conceded,) 
have been arrayed against the free discussion of the slave 
question, and bent, at all hazards, upon its suppression. We 
might specify the riots in New York, in Philadelphia, at TJtica, 
and at Alton, as having been obviously excited beforehand, or 
palliated and excused afterwards, by the editors and public 
speakers devoted to the Colonization cause. The pledge of 
the Societv, beforehand, to visit with its censures, when need- 
ful, the existence of Abolition Societies in America, has been 
amply and even more than literally redeemed. 



the means by which they have been roused. The writer has often been solicited to 
prepare such a volume, and had intended to afford moro space in the present work 
for the details. 



408 ■ GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 



CHAPTER XXXIV. 

ATTEMPTS TO SILENCE THE DISCUSSION BY AUTHORITY — STATE 
LEGISLATURES — FEDERAL EXECUTIVE — U. S. MAILS — GAG 
RULES IN CONGRESS — RIGHT OF PETITION. 

Presentment of a Grand Jury — Literary and Theological Review — Pamphlet of Hon. 
Mr. Sullivan — Rewards offered by Southern Governors for the abduction of North- 
ern Abolitionists — Violent language of pro-slavery clergy and ecclesiastical bodies 
— Southern demands on Northern State Legislatures — Responses of Northern 
Governors — Bill reported in Legislature of Rhode Island — Violation of U. S. Mails 
— Pillage of Post-office at Charleston — Postmaster General — President's Message 
— Accusation against abolitionists — Recommends a prohibition of the circulation 
of their papers by mail — Answer of the Anti-Slavery Ex. Com. — Legislature of 
Massachusetts — Joint Committee — Interview with Anti-Slavery Committee — Their 
defense silenced — Reaction — Prohibitory Legislation defeated — Action in Cougress 
— Calhoun's Mail Report — Recommendation of the President defeated — Act to 
prevent a violation of the mails — Anti-Slavery Petitions — Various "gags" from 
1836 to 1845— John Quincy Adams. 

But measures of mere riotous, irregular, unauthorized vio- 
lence against abolitionists, were soon found inadequate to the 
objects of those who had set them on foot. It was not every 
day that a popular tumult could be roused. By a reaction 
which might have been foreseen, the better part of community, 
touched by sympathy, and excited to reflection and inquir}*-, 
were led to protest against these disorderly proceedings. 
Some of them became abolitionists themselves, and others who 
did not, became justly alarmed at the progress of anarchy, and 
the absence of protecting law. There was danger that the 
tables might be turned, and mobs against abolitionists be fol- 
lowed by mobs against their opposers. It became important, 
therefore, to put down abolitionists by the strong arm of civil 
power. 

Intimations in this direction began to manifest themselves 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 409 

at an early day, and in close connection with the riotous de- 
monstrations already noticed. About a month before the 
great mob at Utica, a Grand Jury of that county, (Oneida) 
comprising a portion of the incipient rioters, or persons in 
sympathy with them, made a presentment in which they say 
that those who form abolition societies are guilty of sedition, 
and of right ought to be punished, and that it is the duty of 
all citizens friendly to the Constitution of the United States, 
to destroy all their publications wherever found. 

The "Literary and Theological Eeview," published in the 
city of New York, conducted by Leonard Woods, Jr., a son 
of Professor Woods of Andover, Mass., (himself afterwards 
Professor of a College in Maine) elaborately defended the 
position that the "radicals" (meaning the abolitionists) were 
"justly liable to t/ie highest civil penalties and ecclesiasticcd cen- 
sures.' 1 ' 1 * 

The Review was patronized by prominent clergymen in 
New York and New England, was approvingly quoted by 
leading religious journals, without eliciting a word of public 
dissent, (except from the proscribed abolitionists) either by 
the school of theologians represented by and in special sym- 
pathy with the " Eeview," or — what is still more remarkable 
— by the Reviews and Journals of the rival theological party, 
in the habit of controverting disputed points, against them. 

Another specimen of the literature of those times may be 
found in a widely circulated pamphlet from the press of a 
popular publishing house in Boston, the same year, from the 
pen of a titled LL.D.,f the previous author of a "Political 
Class Book" for schools, that had gone through several 
editions. The drift of the pamphlet, of 1835, will appear 
from the following : 

" It is to be hoped and expected that Massachusetts will enact laws de- 
claring the printing, publishing, and circulating papers and pamphlets on 
slavery, and also the holding of meetings to discuss slavery and abolition, 



* Literary and TJteological Review for Dec, 1835. 
t Hon. William Sullivan. 



410 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

to be public indictable offenses, and provide for the punishment thereof in 
such manner as will more effectually prevent such offenses." 

If it be thought wonderful that such sentiments could 
emanate from the high places of New York and New Eng- 
land, is it not still more so that no earnest remonstrance, 
either from press, pulpit, or forum, was raised against it, 
excepting only from the threatened victims ? 

The prevalence and the publication of such views at the 
North could not fail to encourage and embolden the enemies 
of liberty and free discussion at the South. Accustomed to 
legislative enactments against the agitation of the slave ques- 
tion among themselves, it was natural that they should expect 
something of the kind from the legislatures of the non-slave- 
holding States, especially when there appeared to be so much 
evidence that leading men at the North were already ripe for 
the measure. A disposition to silence the northern abolition- 
ists by public authority, as well as by other forms of violence, 
had been manifest at the South from the beginning, and there 
now seemed to be a prospect of securing the co-operation of 
the legislatures of the nominally free States. 

As early as Dec. 26, 1831, Gov. Lumpkin, of Georgia, gave 
his approval to an act of the Legislature of that State, offer- 
ing five thousand dollars to any one who would arrest and 
bring to trial, under the laws of that State, the editor or pub- 
lisher of the Boston Liberator. By the laws of Georgia he 
would have been sentenced to death. Mr. Garrison was a 
citizen of Massachusetts, owing no allegiance to Georgia, but 
here was an attempt, by the Government of Georgia, to secure 
his felonious abduction. Yet the Government of Massachu- 
setts took no notice of the insult, nor in any way provided 
for the security of its citizens. 

Other public bodies and popular meetings at the South fol- 
lowed this example, and offered rewards for the abduction of 
Northern abolitionists. Twenty thousand dollars were offered 
at New Orleans for the seizure of Arthur Tappan, and ten 
thousand dollars at some other place for arresting Eev. Amos 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 411 

A. Phelps. Another advertisement specified the names of 
several of the Executive Committee of the American Anti- 
Slavery Society at New York, offering a reward for each or 
either of them. 

Even ministers of religion shared largely in the feelings 
that prompted to these advertisements and did much to coun- 
tenance and inflame them. 

Eev. Eobert N. Anderson, of Virginia, writing to the Ses- 
sions of the Presbyterian Churches of Ilanover Presbytery, 
"in 1835, said : 

"At the approaching stated meeting of the Presbytery, I design to offer 
a preamble and string of resolutions on the subject of the treasonable and 
abominably wicked interference of the Northern and Eastern fanatics with 
our political and civil rights, our property, and our domestic concerns." — 
"If there be any stray goat of a minister among you, tainted with the blood- 
hound principles of abolitionism, let him be ferreted out, silenced, excom- 
municated, AND LEFT TO THE PUBLIC TO DISPOSE OF IN OTHER RESPECTS. 

" Yours in the Lord, Robert N. Anderson." 

Eev. Thomas S. Witherspoon, of Alabama, writing to the 
editor of the Emancipator, said : 

" Let your emissaries dare to cross the Potomac, and I cannot promise 
you that your fate will be less than Hainan's. Then beware how you goad 
an insulted but magnanimous people to deeds of desperation." 

Eev. William S. Plummer, D.D., of Eichmond, Va., in July, 
1835, wrote to the Chairman of a Committee of Correspond- 
ence for calling a public meeting of the clergy of Eichmond, 
on the subject of abolition, in which he said : 

" Let them (the abolitionists) understand that they will be caught if 
they come among us, and they will take good care to keep out of our 
way." " If abolitionists will set the country in a blaze, it is but fair that 
they should receive the first warming of the fire." 

A few days after the famous forcing of the Post-office, the 
violation of the U. S. Mail, and the destruction of anti-slavery 
publications, at Charleston, S. C. (July 29, 1835), a public 
meeting was held for completing that measure, and ferreting 
out and lynching abolitionists. At this assembly, the Charles- 
ton Courier informs us, 



412 GEEAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

" The clergy of all denominations attended in a body, lending their sanc- 
tion to the proceedings, and adding by their presence to the impressive 
character of the scene." 

The thanks of the meeting to the clergy for this service, 
was expressed in a resolution for that purpose. 

Rev. J. C. Postell (Methodist), of South Carolina, some 
time afterwards, addressed a letter to Rev. La Roy Sunder- 
land (Methodist), editor of Zion's WatcJnnan, New York, in 
which he said : 

" If you wish to educate the slaves, I will tell you how to raise the money, 
without editing Zions Watchman. You and old Arthur Tappan come out 
to the South this winter, and they will raise one hundred thousand dollars 
for you. New Orleans itself will be pledged for it. Desiring no further 
acquaintance with you," &c. &c. ! 

It was in the same year (1835) that the ministers and mes- 
sengers of the Goslein Baptist Association, assembled at Free 
Union, Virginia, having adopted resolutions affirming the 
right to slave property, proceeded to denounce the abolition- 
ists as incendiaries and assassins, and intimating that they 
dared not show themselves at the South. 

At the Anniversary of the American Colonization Society 
at Washington City (so late as 1839), Hon. Henry A. Wise, 
M. C, of Virginia, a slaveholder and duellist, said : 

" The best way to meet abolitionists was with DuponVs best (i. e. 
gunpowder) and with cold steel." The N. Y. Suti reported that, after 
Mr. W. had made his speech, Rev. Dr. Gardner Spring, of New York 

City, SPOKE WITH SYMPATHY OF THE SENTIMENTS OF THE SoUTH, AS 
EVINCED IN THE SPEECH OF Mr. "Vi ISE !" 

We can bear testimony that the language here attributed to 
Mr. Wise is but little more violent or reprehensible than was 
frequently used at Colonization meetings that were attended 
by Dr. Spring (one of them in his own "session room") in 
the city of New York, both preceding and after the riots 
against abolitionists, in 1833 and '34. To "silence" and to 
"put down the incendiaries," were expressions very frequently 
employed. 

The reader will now be prepared to understand the records 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 413 

that follow, and appreciate the situation of the friends of 
liberty at that period. * 

Gov. McDuffie, of South Carolina, in his message to the 
Legislature, in Dec., 1S35, declared slavery to be " the corner- 
stone of our republican edifice." The laboring population of 
any community, " bleached or unbleached," he pronounced 
to be a " dangerous element in the body politic." lie pre- 
dicted that the body of the laboring people of the North 
would be virtually reduced to slavery within twenty -five 
years.* Of the measures of abolitionists, he said: "The laws 
of every community should punish this species of interfer- 
ence with death without benefit of clergy,"f &c. &c. 

In pursuance of his recommendation (and, as if desirous of 
fulfilling his prophecy), both branches of the Legislature of 
that State (Dec. 16) adopted the following : 

" Resolved, That the Legislature of South Carolina, having every confi- 
dence in the justice and friendship of the non-slaveholding States, announces 
her confident expectation, and she earnestly requests, that the Government 
of these States will promptly and effectually suppress all those associa- 
tions within their respective limits, purporting to be abolition societies," 
&c., &c. 

December 19, 1835, the General Assembly of North Caro- 
lina adopted the following: 

" Resolved, That our sister States are respectfully requested to enact 
PENAL LAWS, prohibiting the printing, within their respective limits, all 
such publications as may have a tendency to make our slaves discontented." 

January 7, 1836, the Alabama Legislature adopted the fol- 
lowing : 

' " Resolved, That we call upon our sister States, and respectfully request 
them to enact such PENAL LAWS as will finally put an end to the malig- 
nant deeds of the abolitionists." 

Gov. Gayle, of Alabama, had previously demanded of Gov. 
Marcy, of New York, that E. G. Williams, publishing agent 



* The Fugitive Slave law of 1S50 seems well calculated to fulfil the prediction ! 

t The reader will notice the striking coincidence between this language of Gov. 
McDuffie and that of the " Literary and Theological Review," viz : "justly liable to 
the highest civil penalties and ecclesiastical censures." 



414 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

of the American Anti-Slavery Society, should be delivered 
up to - *be tried by the laws of Alabama, (a State into which 
he had never set his foot,) on an indictment against him by 
the Grand Jury of Tuscaloosa County, Ala., for publishing in 
the Emancipator, at New York, the following sentences : 

" God commands, and all nature cries out, that man should not be held 
as property. The system of making men property has plunged 2,250,000 
of our fellow-countrymen into the deepest physical and moral degradation, 
and they are every moment sinking deeper." 

In making this demand, Gov. Gale says : 

" It is admitted that the offender was not in this State when his crime 
was committed, and that he has not fled therefrom, according to the strict 
literal import of that term." 

Gov. Marcy, as may well be supposed, declined acceding to 
the demand. But it was expected that that class of offenses 
might be punished under laws to be enacted in New York. 

Feb. 16, 1836, both houses of the Legislature of Virginia 
agreed to the following : 

" Resolved, That the non-slaveholding States of the Union are respect- 
fully but earnestly requested promptly to adopt PENAL ENACTMENTS, 
or such other measures, as will EFFECTUALLY SUPPRESS ALL 
associations within their respective limits purporting to be, or having the 
character of abolition societies." 

Eesolutions adopted " unanimously," about the same time, 
by the Legislature of Georgia, included the following: 

" Resolved, That it is deeply incumbent on the people of the North to 
CRUSH the traitorous designs of the abolitionists." 

These demands were officially communicated to the Gov- 
ernors of the non-slaveholding States, and by them were laid 
before the respective Legislatures, as matters deserving grave 
consideration and decision. It is not known to the writer 
that in doing this, a single northern Governor availed himself 
of the opportunity to express an opinion adverse to these de- 
mands, much less to speak of them in terms of merited indig- 
nation and rebuke. On the other hand, we have to record 
euch specimens of servility and treachery as the following : 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 415 

Edward Everett, (whig) Governor of Massachusetts, in hifl 
message communicating the southern documents, held the 
following language : 

" Whatever by direct and necessary operation is calculated to excite an 
insurrection among the slaves, has heen held, by highly respectable legal 
authority, an ollense against the peace of this Commonwealth, which may 
be prosecuted as a misdemeanor at common law." 

William L. Marcy, (democratic) Governor of the State of 
New-York, in his message on the same subject, spoke as fol- 
lows : 

" Without the power to pass such laws the States would not possess all 
the necessary means for preserving their external relations of peace among 
themselves." 

This was in January, 1836. In the Legislature of Khode 
Island, Feb. 2d, Mr. Hazard, of Newport, Chairman of a Com- 
mittee appointed on the subject, at a previous session, in Oc- 
tober, 1835,* reported a bill in conformity with the southern 
demands. 

While this question was pending in the legislatures of the 
northern states, the influence of the Federal Executive was 
brought to bear on the side of the Slave Power, and against 
the freedom of the press. The occasion for exerting this in- 
fluence was presented by the excitement growing out of the 
transmission of anti-slavery publications, through the United 
States' Mails. Some of these publications were gratuitously 
s.-nt, not to any portion of the colored people, either the free 
or the enslaved, but to prominent citizens, statesmen, clergy- 
men, merchants, planters, and professional gentlemen at the 
south, whose names and residences were known at the north. 
There could be no reasonable pretense that this measure could 
excite an insurrection of the slaves. Gen. Duff Green, Editor 
of the Washington Telegraph, one of the most violent oppo- 



* This, it will be noticed, was about two mouths previous to the earliest action in 
the Legislatures of the Southern States— so that, in reality, the measure of legisla- 
tive suppression was first broached in the Legislature of a Northern State! The 
subject was introduced into the Legislature of Rhode Island by Mr. Hazard, who 
had presented resolutions of a public meeting in Newport, recommending the measure. 



416 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN" 

sers of abolitionists, admitted that there was little or no dan- 
ger of this ; and that the real ground of apprehension was 
that the publications would "operate upon the consciences and 
fears of slaveholders themselves, from the insinuation of their 
dangerous heresies into our schools, our pulpits and our do- 
mestic circles." — "It is only," (said he,) "by alarming the 
consciences of the weak and feeble, and by diffusing among 
our own people a morbid sensibility on the subject of slavery, 
that abolitionists can accomplish their object. Preparatory 
to this, they are now saturating the non-slaveholding States 
with the belief that slavery is a sin against God," &c. 

The riotous outrage upon the Post-office and the U. S. Mail 
at Charleston, (S. C.) July 29, 1835, has already been alluded 
to. From an editorial of the Charleston Courier, it appears 
that "arrangements had previously been made at the Post- 
office in the city, to arrest the circulation of incendiary 
matter, until instructions could be received from the Post- 
office Department at Washington." The Editor therefore 
thought " it might have been better, perhaps, to have 
awaited the application for instructions before proceeding 
to extremities." In reply to this application, Aug. 5, the 
Postmaster General, Amos Kendall, (a northern man) said : 

'• I am satisfied that the Postmaster General has no legal authority to 
exclude newspapers from the mail, nor to prohibit their carriage or delivery 
on account of their character or tendency, real or supposed." " But I am 
not prepared to direct you to forward or deliver the papers of which you 
speak." '* By no act or direction of mine, official or private, could I be 
induced to aid, knowingly, in giving circulation to papers of this description, 
directly or indirectly. We owe an obligation to the laws, but a higher one 
to the communities in which we live, and if the former be permitted to de- 
stroy the latter, it is patriotism to disregard them. Entertaining these 
views, I cannot sanction, and will not condemn, the step you have taken. 
Your justification must be looked for in the character of the papers detained, 
and the circumstances by which you are surrounded." 

Other Postmasters followed the example of the Post- 
master at Charleston. The measure of suppression was not 
confined to the South. The Postmaster at New- York, 
Samuel L.' Gouverneur, Esq., proposed to the Anti-Slavery 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 417 

Society, " voluntarily to desist from attempting to send their 
publications into the southern states, by public mails." The 
proposition was declined. In answer to a letter from Mr. 
Gouverneur to the Postmaster General, Mr. Kendall wrote 
an elaborate reply, Aug. 22, in which he said : 

" I am deterred from giving an order to exclude the whole series of aboli- 
tion publications from the Southern mails only by a want of legal power, 
and if I were situated as you are. I would do as you have done." 

President Jackson introduced the subject into his annual 
message, Dec, 1835, accusing abolitionists of " unconstitu- 
tional and wicked attempts," and recommending as follows: 

" I would therefore call the special attention of Congress to the subject, 
and respectfully suggest the propriety of passing such a law as will pro- 
hibit, under severe penalties, the circulation, in the Southern States, through 
the mail, of incendiary publications, intended to instigate the slaves to insur- 
rection." 

The winter of 1835-6 was a dark day for the prospects of 
northern freedom. Except by the intended victims of this 
proscription, few, feeble, and hated as they were, no voice of 
remonstrance was uttered, no symptoms of alarm were ex- 
hibited. The adoption of the measures proposed to Congress 
and to the Legislatures of Massachusetts, New- York, Rhode 
Island, and other free states, was anticipated, as a matter of 
course. The mnjority of intelligent citizens expected no 
other result. Abolitionists redoubled their efforts, knowing 
that all was at stake. 

• A searching Review of his Message, in the form of a solemn 
protest, was addressed to President Jackson, by the Executive 
Committee of the American Anti-Slavery Society at New 
York. In the bold and dignified language of conscious inno- 
cence, they denied the charges he had brought against them, 
of insurrectionary designs. They invited investigation by a 
Committee of Congress, and offered to submit to their inspec- 
tion all their publications, all their correspondence, and all 
their accounts, and promising to attest them, and to answer 
every question under oath. No notice was ever taken by the 
President of this Protest, but it must have had its effect. His 

27 



418 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

charges were never repeated by President Jackson, or by any 
of his successors. 

An Anti-Slavery Convention at Providence (R. I.) for 
forming a Khode Island State Anti-Slavery Society, Feb. 2, 
1886, had been invited by a call of respectable citizens in all 
parts of the State. It was numerously attended, well sus- 
tained, and did much to revive the spirit of Eoger Williams 
in that part of New England. 

A joint Committee of both Houses of the Legislature of 
Massachusetts, Senator Lunt, Chairman, was appointed to con- 
sider and report, upon the southern demands. Abolitionists 
requested the customary privilege of a hearing before this 
Committee, but no notice, for a long time, was taken of the 
request. It was believed that no hearing would be given. 
The Anti-Slavery Committee at Boston, were at length unex- 
pectedly notified that an audience would be given them, the 
very next day, March 4th, 1836. They hastily rallied, selected 
their advocates, and prepared for their defense. The inter- 
view was held in the Representatives' Hall, neither of the 
houses being in session, but most of the members of both 
houses, and many prominent citizens being present. After 
remarks by Rev. Samuel J. Ma} r , and Ellis Gray Loring, Esq., 
they were followed by Prof. Charles Follen, who, in the 
course of his remarks, alluded to the recent outrages against 
abolitionists, observing that any legislative enactments or 
censures against the already persecuted part}^, would tend to 
encourage their assailants, and increase their persecutions. 
Taking offense at this remark, the Chairman, Mr. Lunt, 
silenced Prof. Follen, and abruptly terminated the interview ; 
whereupon the abolitionists took prompt measures for issu- 
ing their suppressed defense in a pamphlet form, which, com- 
prising above 40 pages, was prepared for the press in the two 
following days. A Boston Editor, Benjamin F. Halle t, Esq., 
gave some account of the proceedings, and said the abolition- 
ists were entitled to a fair hearing. The Legislature directed 
their Committee to allow a completion of the defense, which 
was accordingly notified for Monday, P. M., the 8th inst. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 419 

The adjacent country was by this time roused, and the hall 
of the Representatives was crowded. Prof. Follen concluded 
his speech, and was followed by Samuel E. Sewall, Esq., 
William Lloyd Garrison, and William Goodell, the latter of 
whom, instead of making any farther defense of abolition- 
ists, or proving that their publications were not insurrection- 
ary, proceeded to charge upon the southern states who had 
made these demands, a conspiracy against the liberties of the 
free North. This opened an entire new field. Great uneasi- 
ness was manifested by the Committee, but the speaker, 
though repeatedly interrupted by the Chairman, succeeded in 
quoting the language of Gov. McDuffie's message, and in cha- 
racterizing the southern documents, to which, he pointed, lying 
on the table of the Committee before him, as being fetters for 
northern freemen. He had commenced making the inquiry — 
11 Mr. Chairman ! Are you prepared to attempt putting them 
on?" — but the sentence was only about half finished, when 
the stentorian voice of the Chairman interrupted him: — "Sit 
down, sir /" — lie sat down. The Legislative Committee pre- 
sently began to move from their seats, but the audience sat 
petrified with suppressed feeling. The late Dr. William E. 
Channing was seated among the abolitionists, though not in 
form nor in sentiment fully identified with them. On such an 
occasion he could not be absent, and his presence was felt. 
His countenance seemed to express what words could not 
have uttered ; more eloquent in silence than even he could 
have been in speech. The Legislative Committee themselves 
lingered, as in vague expectation. Then rose a respectable 
merchant of Boston, Mr. Bond, unaccustomed, as he said, to 
public speaking, and begged the Committee to wait a few 
minutes. It was growing dark, and the hall unliglried, but 
they sat down. Mr. Bond briefly reminded them that free- 
dom of speech and of the press could never be surrendered 
by the sons of the pilgrims. He was followed by another 
volunteer, a Dr. Bradley, from old Plymouth rock. The 
Committee then rose again, and, with the audience, slowly 
and quietly retired. A low murmur of voices, though too 



420 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

low to be distinctly articulate, was heard through the dim 
hall of the People's Representatives, but the very tones of 
which, like the distant roar of the sea, told of power. The 
printed plea of the abolitionists was, three days afterwards, 
on the desk of each member of the Legislature, in the hands 
of the Governor, and in process of circulation through the 
Commonwealth. Mr. Lunt and his Committee delayed their 
Report, till near the close of the session, several weeks after- 
wards. It was a stale repetition of trite declamation on the 
subject, but recommending no distinct action by the legisla- 
ture. What disposition was made of it we do not remember, 
and the political prospects of Mr. Senator Lunt shared its 
oblivion. 

" As goes Massachusetts, so goes New England." The bill 
of Mr. Hazard, in the Legislature of Rhode Island, was de- 
feated by the energy and spirit of two members from Provi- 
dence, George Curtiss and Thomas W. Dorr. 

By the Legislature of the State of New- York, a Report was 
adopted in May, 1830, responding to the sentiments of Gov. 
Marcy's Message, and pledging the faith of the State to enact 
such laws whenever they shall be requisite. This Report ap- 
pears to have been sent to the Governors of the Southern 
States, but never appeared in the organ of the New-York 
State Administration, (the Albany Argus) in which the acts 
of the State Government are " by authority" published. The 
citizens of the State of New-York, in general, (including abo- 
litionists who were watching for the document) were unap- 
prized of its contents until they saw it quoted, the winter 
following, in the message of the acting Governor of Virginia. 
There were indications, in the year 1837, in the State of New 
York, that the project of legislative suppression was not re- 
linquished. 

The proposition of President Jackson to Congress, for an 
act prohibiting, under severe penalties, the circulation of in- 
surrectionary publications through the mails, was referred to 
a Select Committee, of which John C. Calhoun was Chairman, 
by whom a Report was submitted, Feb. 4th, 1836, of a very 






SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 421 

remarkable character. It conclusively proved and maintained 
that the measure recommended by the President would be a 
violation of the Constitution and an infringement of the liber- 
ties secured under it. It would, moreover, be unsafe for the 
interests of slavery. 

" Nothing is more clear," says the Report, " than that the admission of 
the right to Congress to determine what papers are incendiary, and, as such, 
to prohibit their circulation through the mail, necessarily involves the right 
to determine what are not incendiary, and enforce their circulation." . . . 
" It" Congress may this year decide what incendiary publications auk, they 
may, next year, decide what they are not, and thus laden their mails with 
real though covert abolitionism." ..." It belongs to the states, and not to 
Congress, to determine what is or is not calculated to disturb their security." 

The Eeport, therefore, proceeded to maintain that when 
the several states had determined, severally, what publications 
were incendiary, the Federal Government and all the other 
States, were bound to conform to those determinations, and 
act accordingly. Congress must enact a law prohibiting the 
transmtssion of sacJi publications through the mails, and every 
other State in the Union is bound to pass laws in concurrence, 
that is, prohibiting publication and discussion! Thus Con- 
gress and all the States were to be controlled by the legisla- 
tion of one State ! And powers unsafe to be conferred by the 
people upon their Representatives in Congress, (as the Report 
had shown) were nevertheless to be exercised by the legisla- 
ture of a single slave State, over the whole country! The 
Report was accompanied by a Bill in accordance with its re- 
commendations. It contained the following : 

" Be it enacted, &c, That it shall not be lawful for any deputy post- 
master, in any State, Territory, or District, of the United States, know- 
ingly, to deliver to any person whatsoever, any pamphlet, newspaper, hand- 
bill, or other printed paper or pictorial representation, touching the subject 
of slavery, where, by the laws of the said State, Territory, or District, 
their circulation is prohibited, and any deputy postmaster who shall be 
guilty thereof, shall be forthwith removed from office." 

On the question of a third reading in the Senate, the votes 
were eighteen to eighteen. The Vice President, Mr. Van 



422 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

Buren, came forward and voted for the reading. It was bow- 
ever defeated on the final vote. 

The project of restrictive legislation over the mails, was 
abandoned. Not only so : the credit of the Post-office De- 
partment was found to have received such a shock by the 
disorders that had given rise to these projects, that, instead 
of an act requiring such a discrimination as the President had 
recommended, the nation was astonished with an enactment, 
approved by the Presidential signature, (after having been 
passed without debate) prohibiting such a discrimination under 
severe and degrading penalties. The right of abolitionists 
to the use of the United States' mails was thus established ! 
And before the close of the same session, Mr. Calhoun con- 
ceded, in the Senate, that the purposes and operations of the 
abolitionists were only moral and suasive, and not violent and 
insurrectionary. 

ASSAULTS OX THE RIGHT OF PETITION. 

Since neither riots nor legislation were likely to crush the 
abolitionists, the next expedient was to break down the right 
of petition, and to stifle the discussion in Congress. Abo- 
litionists had deluged the Senate and House of Pvepresenta- 
tives with petitions for the abolition of slavery in the Federal 
District and Territories, and for the prohibition of the inter- 
state slave trade. Now came the era of the "gags? 

We give a list of them with the names of the movers, the 
dates, and the votes in the House, by which they were carried. 

1. Pinckney's, May 26th, 1836.— Yeas 117— Nays 68. 

2. Hawes', Jan. 18th, 1837.— Yeas 115— Nays 47. 

3. Patton's, Dec. 21st, 1837.— Yeas 122— Nays 74. 

4. Atherton's, Jan. 12th, 1838.— Yeas 126— Nays 78. 

5. Johnson's, incorporated into the standing rules of the 
House, and thenceforward known as the 21st rule. Jan. 28, 
1840.— Yeas 114— Nays 108. 

On the 7th of June, 1841, during an extra session, the vote 
by which this rule was "discarded" was — Yeas 112 — Nays 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 423 

104. This was done by a vote adopting all the standing rules, 
sting the 21st, but a special rule was immediately afterwards 
adopted, applicable only to the extra session, by which it was 
established that on the presentation of petitions on subjects 
not included in the President's Message, (except a bankrupt 
law) "objection to the reception shall be considered as made, 
and the question of reception shall be laid on the table." This 
was, in effect, a new gag of a general character, operating upon 
anti-slavery petitions, but not confined to them. All petitions 
as well 'as abolition petitions, were excluded, and people began 
to open their eyes to the fact that the entire nation, as well as 
the troublesome agitators, were gagged ! 
The original gag of Mr. Pinckncy was as follows : 

". Resoh-ed, That all petitions, memorials, resolutions, and propositions, 
relating, in any way, or to any extent, whatever, to the subject of 
slavery, shall, without being either printed or referred, be laid on the table, 
and no further action whatever shall be had thereon." 

The succeeding ones were substantially the same. 

In the session of 1841-2, a Report was prepared re-enacting 
the gag ; but fearing to trust a vote upon it in the House, its 
authors adroitly laid it on the table, under the previous ques- 
tion, where it could not be taken up without a two-thirds vote. 
The effect of this (the extra session having passed) was to re- 
store the 21st Rule. This was continued until December, 
1845, when it was finally rescinded. 

JOHN QUINCY ADAMS. 

The long protracted efforts of John Quincy Adams, who 
was not an immediate abolitionist, to restore the right of peti- 
tion, are too well understood to require a minute record in 
this place. They constituted the crowning act of his laborious 
public life, and rendered him the benefactor of his countr}^. 
Mr. Adams also opposed the annexation of Texas, and the 
Mexican war. He declared that the General Government, in 
time of war, had a discretionary power to emancipate the 
slaves. He proposed in Congress a plan for the prospective 



424 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

abolition of slavery, through an amendment of the Constitu- 
tion, a proposition which, by-the-by, received no favor either 
at the North or the South, thus testing the sincerity of those 
who professed to be opposed to slavery, and in favor of its 
gradual removal, while they only deprecated the imprudent 
measures of the immediatists. Mr. Adams was threatened 
with assassination, with an indictment by a Grand Jury of 
the District, and with expulsion from the House. A formal 
effort was made to pass a censure upon him, but it did not 
succeed. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 425 



CHAPTER XXXV. 

OPPOSITION FROM LEADING CLERGY AND ECCLESIASTICAL 
BODIES. 

Recapitulation of Preceding Statements — Theological Seminaries— Ecclesiastical 
Bodies— Law of Lane Seminary against discussion (1834)— Conference of Meth. 
Epis. Ch., Cincinnati (1S36)— Ohio Annual Conference (previous)— New York An- 
nual Conference, (June, 1836, 1838)— Sentiments of Methodist Ministers— Official 
course of Presiding Elders and Bishops— Presbyterian Synod of Philadelphia- 
Associations of Congregational Ministers in Connecticut and Massachusetts in 
1836—" Pastoral Letters" of 1836, and 1837— Extraordinary claims of Congregational 
Pastors— Origin of disaffection towards the Clergy on the part of a class of Abo- 
litionists. 

While these efforts were making to put down abolitionists 
by mob violence, by State legislation, by denunciations from 
the Federal Executive, by violations of the U. S. Mails, by 
closing the Post-offices against their publications, by gagging 
discussion in Congress, and overthrowing the people's right 
of petition, there was still another power, more potent than all 
the others, standing behind and sustaining them all, with which 
abolitionists were called to contend. We mean the prevailing 
and predominant religious influences of the country, repre- 
sented by and controlling theological seminaries, religious 
associations, churches, and ecclesiastical bodies. It is the reli- 
gion of a country that shapes its political and social manifest- 
ations, under all forms of government, more especially under 
those of a popular character. 

The position of the principal religious sects, respecting 
slavery, was exhibited in former chapters.* It appeared also 
in their support of the Colonization Society.f The opposition 



* Chap. XII. to XVIII. t Chap. XXIX. 



426 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

of Theological Reviews, of religious journals, and of promi- 
nent clergymen, has been adverted to in the present connec- 
tion.* It was to be expected that corresponding manifesta- 
tions should be witnessed in Theological Seminaries and the 
action of ecclesiastical bodies. A few specimens must suffice, 
in this record. 

Among the earliest and boldest attempts to suppress the 
discussion of the slave question in America, we have to record 
the gag law of Lane Seminary, Ohio, October 6, 1834, by 
which the students were ordered to disband both their Anti- 
Slavery and Colonization Societies, (for it was important to 
appear impartial,) and, in a standing rule, forbidden to lecture, 
deliver addresses, or hold meetings among themselves, except 
of a devotional character. This was during the reign of mob 
violence against abolitionists, and more than a year before 
the demands of Gov. McDuffie and his Southern associates 
upon the free States of the North. The well known occasion 
was the formation of a flourishing Anti-Slavery Society. 
Though most of the students left the Seminary in consequence, 
and the laws were soon after repealed, yet the same spirit per- 
vaded theological and literary institutions in general, and in- 
fluences were generally exerted in them which prevented free 
discussion and inquiry. 

In showing the position of the Methodist Episcopal Church 
on the slave question, we have already noticed the declaration 
of its General Conference at Cincinnati, in 1836, in which 
they " disclaim any right, wish, or intention, to interfere in the 
civil and political relation between master and slave, as it ex- 
ists in the slaveholding States of this Union." At this same 
Conference a preamble and resolutions were adopted depre- 
cating " the great excitement on the subject of modern aboli- 
tionism," and the course of some of its members, as " calculated 
to bring upon this body the suspicion and distrust of the com- 
munity." They declared themselves " decidedly opposed to 
modern abolitionism." It was also 



See last two chapters. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 427 

" Resolved, by the Delegates of the Annual Conferences, in General Con- 
ference assembled, that they disapprove, in the most unqualified Bense, the 
conduct of the two members of the General Conference, who arc reported 
to have lectured in this city recently, upon, and in favor of, modern aboli- 
tionism." 

This resolution was adopted by a vote of 122 to 11. The 
mover, Kev. S. G. Roszell, was reported to have said, in the 
debate, that he wished the Rev. Orange Scott (one of the cen- 
sured members) was in heaven — (that is, he wished he was 
dead :) — in perfect keeping with the murderous sentiments so 
freely expressed by pro-slavery clergymen at that period, 
some specimens of which the reader has already seen. 

This same Conference received a friendly address from the 
Methodist Wesleyan Conference in England, on the subject of 
slavery, but refused to publish it. They adopted, moreover, 
a pastoral address to the communicants of the M. E. Church, 
in which, after stating that the "Constitutional Compact" be- 
tween the States precluded Church action against slavery, they 
added, 

" These facts, which are only mentioned here as a reason for the friendly 
admonition which we wish to give you, constrain us, as your pastors, who 
are called to watch over your souls, as they must give an account, to ex- 
hort you to abstain from all abolition movements and associations, and to 
refrain from patronizing any of their publications," &c. &c. * * * 

" From every view of the subject which we have been able to take, and 
from the most calm and dispassionate survey of the whole ground, we have 
come to the conclusion that the only safe, scriptural, and prudent way for 
us, both as ministers and people, to take, is, wholly to refrain from 
this agitating subject," &c. — Signed by order and in behalf of the 
General Conference of the M. E. Church, by the Bishops. 

The General Conference represented both the northern and 
the southern portions of the M. E. Church, acting together. 
But northern Annual Conferences took the same ground. 

The Ohio Annual Conference had, a short time before, 
Resolved, 

1. " That we deeply regret the proceedings of the abolitionists and anti- 
slavery societies in the free States, and the consequent excitement produced 
thereby in the slave States, that we, as a Conference, disclaim all connection 
and co-operation with, or belief in the same, and that we hereby recommend 



428 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

to our junior preachers, local brethren, and private members within our 
bounds, to abstain from any connection with them, or participation of their 
acts, in the premises, whatever. 

2. " That those brethren and citizens of the North who resist the abo- 
lition movements with firmness and moderation, are the true friends to the 
Church, to the slaves of the South, and to the Constitution of our common 
country," &c. 

The New- York Annual Conference, in June, 1836, ap- 
proved the doings of the General Conference, and disapproved 
the patronizing of Zion's "Watchman, an anti-slavery Meth- 
odist paper, edited by Rev. La Roy Sunderland. It also Re- 
solved that — 

# * * « We are decidedly of the opinion that none ought to be elected 
to the office of a deacon or elder in our church, unless he give a pledge 
to the Conference that he will refrain from agitating the church 
on this subject," &c. &c. 

In 1838, the same Conference resolved that any of its mem- 
bers or probationers who should patronize Zion's Watchman, 
recommend it, circulate it, obtain subscribers, or collect or 
remit moneys for it, "shall be deemed guilty of indiscretion, 
and dealt with accordingly." 

" The Rev. George W. Langhorne, of North Carolina, in writing to the 
editor of Zion's Watchman, June -25, 1836, said : 

" If you have not yet resigned your credentials as a minister of the Metho- 
dist Episcopal Church, I really think that, as an honest man, you should 
now do it." "You are bound to submit to their authority [the General 
Conference], or leave the church." 

This sentiment, that abolitionists ought to quit the churches 
or cease disturbing their peace by anti-slavery agitation, was 
very current in the churches of most sects, even at the North, 
at this period, though much has been since said against the 
sin of schism, when abolitionists secede. 

Presiding Elders refused to put anti-slavery resolutions in Quarterly 
Conferences, but readily put pro-slavery ones. 

Bishops Hedding and Emory addressed a Pastoral Letter to the New 
England and New Hampshire Conferences, in which the anti-slavery excite- 
ment in that part of the country was discountenanced. They "advised 
the preachers, the trustees, and official and other members, to manifest their 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 429 

disapprobation, and to refuse the use of their pulpits ajid houses for such 
purposes." 

" Bishop Waugh refused to put a motion to raise a committee on slavery 
at the N. E. Conference of 1837, and declared ' that there should be do 
appeal from his decision to the Conference. Bishop Iledding, at the N. K. 
Conference, in 1837, refused a motion to raise a committee on slavery, only 
on certain conditions.' " 

" Bishop Soule, presiding at the New England Conference of the M, E. 
Church in 1840, refused permission asked by Rev. O. Scott to read a memo- 
rial from private members of the church, requesting the Annual Conference 
to express an opinion against the ' Colored testimony Resolution' of the 
General Conference." — True Wesleyan, Dec. 27, 1851. 

The Presbyterian Synod of Philadelphia, about the same 
time, re-echoed the stale and truthless slanders of the newspa- 
pers against the abolitionists. 

It is to be borne in mind that these ecclesiastical efforts to 
suppress the discussion of the slave question, in May and 
June, 1836, came as closely as possible on the heel of the leg- 
islative attempts to the same effect, in the national and state 
legislatures, the previous winter, being the first opportunity 
that had presented itself by the accustomed annual meetings 
of these bodies, since the famous demands of the Governors 
and Legislatures of the Slave States. They are to be inter- 
preted in the light of the silence and apparent acquiescence 
of the leading clergy and religious journalists, during that 
dark period, except when, as already stated, their influence 
was on the side of " the highest civil penalties and ecclesiastical 
censures." The former had been attempted, and (though, in 
some states, they were still pending,) there was a prospect of 
their failure. Now came the time to try the power of the 
latter. The authorities of the Methodist Episcopal Church 
were speaking. It would not do for the guardians of New 
England Congregationalism to be behind them. 

The Associations of Congregational Ministers, first of Con- 
necticut, and, immediately afterwards, of Massachusetts, mov- 
ing evidently in concert, and with the aid of prominent Pres- 
byterian clergymen from New- York and Ohio, in attendance 



430 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

for that object, united in adopting a series of Eesolutions, 
among which was the following : 

" Resolved, That the operations of itinerant agents and lecturers attempt- 
ing to enlighten the churches in respect to particular points of Christian 
doctrine and of Christian morals, and to control the religious sentiment of 
the community on topics which fall most appropriately within the sphere of 
pastoral instruction, and pastoral discretion, as to time and manner, without 
the advice and consent of the pastors and regular ecclesiastical bodies, 
are an unauthorized interference with the RIGHTS, duties, and discretion 
of the stated ministry, dangerous to the influence of the pastoral office, 
and fatal to the peace and good order of the churches." 

The evident design of this was to close the Congregational 
meeting-houses and pulpits against anti-slavery lecturers and 
anti-slavery meetings, which were at that time beginning to 
be greatly multiplied, and which were exerting a powerful 
influence. It became necessary, for the sake of consistency, 
and also to maintain the high powers thus claimed for Con- 
gregational pastors, to apply the same rule to "itinerating 
evangelists, 1 ' which was accordingly done in another Eesolution. 
The series was closed by a pledge of the clergy, " that \«e 
consider ourselves bound to sustain each other, and the churches, 
in standing against all these invasions of our ecclesiastical 
order." 

Under this pledge, even abolitionists belonging to the 
pastoral body, felt themselves bound to exclude anti-slavery 
lecturers and preachers from their pulpits, in deference to 
the wishes of the clerical body to which they belonged. This 
Congregational precedent was followed, (as designed by the 
movers,) in Presbyteries and Synods of the Presbyterian 
church, all over the free states. It was a flagrant violation 
of the "ecclesiastical order" of Congregationalism, sustained 
only by the bad usages under the old " Saybrook Platform," 
by which Whitefield, Tennant, and Finley had been shut 
out of the pulpits, and even made liable to imprisonment 
and banishment, through joint ecclesiastical and legislative 
action, a century previous. 

It was objected to these Resolutions, while under discus- 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 431 

sion in the Connecticut General Association, that they would 
tend to encourage the mobs against anti-slavery lecturers, 
which were then rife in that region. The taunting retort 
was, that abolitionists, according to their own motto, ought 
not to shrink from the consequences! Among the abolition 
lecturers then at work in Connecticut, was a Congregational 
minister of that state. lie persevered in the work, till, find- 
ing his way hedged up by his clerical brethren, he retired 
from the field ; — not because a portion of the people in the 
parishes were not desirous to hear him, but because the pas- 
tors would not suffer him to be heard ! 

A Pastoral Letter to the churches accompanied the Reso- 
lutions of 1836, and breathing the same spirit. A still more 
famous Pastoral Letter was sent forth by the General Associa- 
tion of Massachusetts, a year afterwards, June, 1837. The 
evils of anti-slavery agitation had not ceased. A new class 
of anti-slavery lecturers had appeared, creating still greater 
alarm. Two talented Quaker ladies, the Misses Grimke, 
daughters of the late distinguished Judge Grimke, of South 
Carolina, once slaveholders, but now earnest abolitioni.-ts, 
were lecturing in the old Commonwealth. They had com- 
menced by addressing female audiences, but had been pre- 
vailed upon to admit listeners of the other sex, who could 
seldom hear without going away convinced. Another cleri- 
cal manifesto was deemed necessary to avert the calamity im- 
pending over the commonwealth and the churches. 

" We would call your attention" (say they) " to the importance of main- 
taining that respect and deference to the pastoral office which is 
enjoined in Scripture, and which is essential to the hest influence of the 
ministry on you and your children. One way in which this respect has 
been, in some cases, violated, is in encouraging lecturers and preachers on 
certain topics of reform, to present their subjects within the parochial limits 
of settled pastors without their consent. Your minister is ordained of 
God to be your teacher, and is commanded to feed that flock over which 
the Holy Ghost hath made him overseer. If there are certain topics on 
which he does not preach with the frequency or in the manner that would 
please you, it is a violation of sacred and important rights to encourage 
a stranger to present them." 



432 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

The Pastoral Letter then dilates upon the appropriate sphere 
of woman, and the danger of her stepping into the wrong 
place. Quaker women had long been accustomed to preach 
in New England, and occasionally in Congregational meeting- 
houses, without alarming ecclesiastical bodies, but they were 
now preaching successfully in favor of immediate emancipa- 
tion, and against the prejudice that fed the Colonization So- 
ciety ; — and the clergy became alarmed. 

When it is remembered that " the parochial limits of settled 
pastors" are intended to cover (if they do sometimes lack a 
little of it) the entire area of the Commonwealth — every foot 
of the soil in it — the modesty of the demand becomes as 
apparent as the condition of a people who should be led to 
recognize such " sacred and important rights." Whatever the 
pastor might preach, or omit preaching, his "rights are vio- 
lated" if any one else is encouraged to lecture or preach ! The 
religious " rights" of the community, if proportionately circum- 
scribed to meet this demand, may be represented by a cypher 
— they utterly vanish away. 

Whether it was too late in the day, or too early, to set up 
pretensions like these, it was certainly attempted at a very 
unfortunate moment. A small portion of the " prudence" so 
much commended, would have withheld the conservative 
clergy from broaching so exciting a topic. The great are not 
always wise. 

If a portion of abolitionists have come to regard the insti- 
tutions of Church and Clergy with unreasonable aversion, the 
reader may now see, as posterity will certainly see, the school 
in which they have been trained. If Christian institutions, if 
the Bible, if anything pertaining to true religion falls into tem- 
porary disrepute, a fearful weight of responsibility rests on the 
clerical bodies wko have so recklessly and needlessly furnished 
the occasion. It would be difficult to fasten upon any class 
of abolitionists the charge of having been disrespectful towards 
the church and the clergy, until manifestations like these had 
appeared. Had the pastors manfully discharged their duty 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 433 

in reproving the giant sin of the country, instead of waiting 
for the stones to cry out, they might have magnified their 
high calling, promoted the cause of religion, delivered their 
country from thraldom, and their own memories from merited 
disgrace. 

28 



,434 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 



CHAPTER XXXVI. 

PERSECUTIONS OF ABOLITIONISTS. 

Ecclesiastical persecutions— La Roy Sunderland— Lewis Tappan— E. W. Goodwin- 
Presbyteries and Church Sessions—" Friends"— Charles Harriot and Isaac T. 
Hopper— Other modes of persecution— Principal victims— Benjamin Lundy— 
William Lloyd Garrison— Miss Prudence Crandall— Dr. Reuben Crandall— George 
Storrs— Jonathan Walker— Elijah P. Lovcjoy— John B. Mahan— Alanson Work 
—James E. Burr— George Thompson— Charles T. Torrey— William L. Chaplin- 
Messrs. Drayton and Sayres. 

Neither northern legislative enactments, nor riots, nor 
personal assaults, could prove of much permanent service in 
the work of suppressing free discussion and punishing deeds 
of mercy to the poor, without other and more permanent 
instrumentalities. These were furnished by the ecclesiastical 
machinery of the sects at the North, and the sanguinary slave 
code of the South. Whenever active abolitionists fell into 
the hands of either of* these, they expected no mercy, or ex- 
pected only to discover their mistake. 

No persecutions of abolitionists have been perhaps so vex- 
atious, so annoying, so exhausting, or, on the whole, so 
effective, as those suffered by some of the more active among 
them, in their church or ecclesiastical relations. Not that 
their anti-slavery principles and measures were, in very many 
cases, charged directly against them as heresies or crimes. It 
was not commonly the policy of their persecutors to pursue 
precisely that course. It was always easy to harass them 
with unfounded charges of disorderly or disorganizing con- 
duct, and thus cripple, and harass, and disgrace, and discour- 
age them. The trials of La Roy Sunderland, of Lewis Tappan, 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 435 

and of E. W. Goodwin, were but specimens of the persecu- 
tions of scores and hundreds, if not thousands, of less promi- 
nent, but equally faithful and abused men. The records of 
Presbyterian Church Sessions and Presbyteries, would alone 
furnish ample materials for a humiliating but instructive 
volume of such details, even in a very condensed form. 
Similar persecutions have been encountered all over the coun- 
try in the walks of social and domestic life. The " gospel 
of deliverance to the captives" has " not brought peace upon 
the earth, but a sword" — " a man's foes have been those of 
his own household;" and if the "prophets" of emancipation 
are looking for "honor," it seems not likely to come from those 
of their " own country and kindred." Even those who are 
now preparing to " enter into their labors" have already 
learned the art and policy of disparaging them. 

The vast powers wielded by clerical bodies, missionary 
boards, conventions, and managers and committees of bene- 
volent societies, have been exerted to cripple and crush aboli- 
tionists who would persist in agitating the slave question. 

These ecclesiastical annoyances and persecutions have not 
been confined to the sects whose general associated action has 
been found recorded on the side of slavery, or whose recog- 
nized leaders have labored to press the Bible into its support. 
Sects claiming the reputation of being decidedly anti-slavery 
— sects that do not allow slaveholding among their members, 
nor maintain any ecclesiastical connection with slaveholders, 
have opposed the agitation of the subject by anti-slavery 
societies, and have censured and even excommunicated their 
members for their activity in them. The Llicksite Friends, 
for example, in the City and State of New York, disowned 
two of their most estimable members, Charles Harriot of 
Athens, and Isaac T. Hopper of New York city, solely for 
that cause. The only excuse was the sanctimonious plea that 
" Friends" must not mingle with " the world," nor co-operate 
with other sects. The real fact was, that " Friends" in gen- 
eral had so "mingled with the world" in its commercial 
cupidity and its political servility, as to sympathize with 



436 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

"other sects" in their hatred of active abolitionists. Their 
members can co-operate with their fellow-citizens of other 
sects, to elect slaveholding and slave-hunting Presidents of the 
United States, without fear of church censure. The " Friends" 
in New England are extensively and largely interested in the 
cotton manufacture, and like most of that class, are averse to 
an agitation which is offensive to the planters. And hence 
an earnest and active Quaker abolitionist loses caste with his 
sect. 

It would be strange if there were not many apostacies 
under such trials. Yet unremitting persecution has proved 
less effective than a brief season of it, alternated with patron- 
age, and flattery, and favor. It has been by these adroit appli- 
ances that the ranks of reformers, especially among clergy- 
men and leading laymen, have been corrupted and thinned. 
There are many who withstood manfully the tempest of 
popular fury, and even the prospect of imprisonment, who 
have since fainted under the sunshine of political or ecclesi- 
astical favor, or been laid asleep by the fireside of domestic 
quiet. But others have taken their places. " The last have 
been first, and the first last, for many are called, but few are 
chosen." 

We will now notice some other forms of persecution, and 
in doing this, will briefly recapitulate some of the prominent 
cases, with the names of the victims. 

Benjamin Lundy was repeatedly assaulted in the streets 
of Baltimore, and once brutally beaten by Austin Woolfolk, 
a slave-trader, before any of the modern Anti-slavery So- 
cieties were organized. Mr. Lundy was a feeble man, a quiet, 
unresisting Quaker, but the "peculiar institutions" of South- 
ern Chivalry provided no protection for him. 

William Lloyd Garrison's imprisonment in Baltimore, 
and the violent assault upon his person, and his imprisonment 
in Boston, have been narrated already. — (See Chap. XXXII.) 

Miss Prudence Crandall, a pious and benevolent young 
lady, established and taught a school for colored pupils, at 
Canterbury, Conn. Through the influence of leading mem- 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 437 

bers of the Colonization Society, an Act of the State Legisla- 
ture against such schools was procured, and was enforced by 
the imprisonment of Miss Crandall, in 1833. The school hav- 
ing been resumed, was finally broken up by lawless violence 
in September, 183-1. 

Dr. Reuben Crandall of Westchester county, (N. Y.) a 
brother of Miss Prudence Crandall, having located himself in 
Washington City to teach botany, was arrested and thrown 
into prison, Aug. 11, 1835, on charge of circulating incen- 
diary publications, with intent to excite the slaves to insur- 
rection. After lying in jail above eight months, till April 
15, 1836, he was brought to trial before Judge Cranch. The 
evidence against him only proved that he had in his trunk 
some anti-slavery pamphlets and papers, that the latter were 
used by him in wrapping up his botanical specimens, and 
that, on request, he had lent to a white citizen, one of the 
pamphlets. The "incendiary" matter read in court from 
these papers, were articles against slavery, and in favor of 
the right of the free colored people to reside in this country. 
The effort to prove Dr. Crandall a member of an Anti-slavery 
Society failed. Yet the District Attorney, Francis S. Key, 
Esq., a leading advocate and an officer of the Colonization 
Society, by whose vigilance Dr. Crandall had been indicted 
and arrested, (avowing, from the first, his determination to 
subject him to capital punishment,) persisted, vehemently, 
and in the use of the most inflammatory and approbrious 
language, to urge upon the jury a verdict of guilty. The 
counsel for the accused urged that the "incendiary" matter 
read in court did not exceed in severity the language used by 
Mr. Jefferson, Patrick Henry, and other Southern gentlemen, 
including even Mr. Key himself, when declaiming against 
slavery.* He attributed this excitement and prosecution to 
the rivalry between the Colonization and Abolition Societies. 

* It was a constant ruse with the orators of Colouizatiouism, to declaim against 
slavery, in order to enlist and use up the energies and means of philanthropists, 
while, in almost the same breath, they would justify slaveholders, and denounce the 
4i incendiary abolitionists.'™ 



438 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

The jury, after a short deliberation, returned a verdict of 
not guilty* But the murderous work of the prosecutors was 
effected. His damp dungeon and close confinement, while 
awaiting the trial, had fixed upon him a lingering consump- 
tion, of which he died at Kingston, Jamaica, about the first 
of February, 1838. He was a gentleman of high literary and 
scientific acquirements, captivating manners, and dignified de- 
portment, a scholar, a devoted Christian, and one of the purest, 
most disinterested, and most amiable of men. Thus was a 
worthy citizen of a free state incarcerated and, in effect, mur- 
dered, though adjudged innocent, in the Federal District, on 
the national hearth-stone, under "exclusive jurisdiction of 
Congress," for no fault but having come under suspicion of 
having disseminated publications hostile to slavery and the 
Colonization Society! 

Amos Dresser of Ohio, a young student in theology, 
travelling in Tennessee to distribute Bibles, was flogged 
twenty lashes on his bare back in the public square in Nash- 
ville, July 25, 1835. His crime was being a member of an 
Anti-slavery Society, and having some anti-slavery publica- 
tions in his trunk. Some church members assisted in the 
outrage. 

Geo. Storrs, a Methodist preacher, and agent of the Anti- 
slavery Society, having accepted an invitation to address an 
Anti-slavery Society in Northfield, (N. H.) assembled with 
them for that j;>urpose, December 14, 1835, but was dragged 
from his knees, while at prayer, by the deputy sheriff, David 
Tilton, in virtue of a warrant issued by Nathan Wells, Esq., 
Justice, on complaint of Benjamin Rogers, charging Mr. 
Storrs with being an "idle and disorderly person" — "a com- 
mon railer and brawler" — "going about the town and county 
and disturbing the public peace." On trial before Judge At- 
kinson, he was discharged. But on the 31st of March, 1836, 
after having lectured at Pittsfield, N. H., Mr. Storrs was 



* Vide " Trial of Reuben Crandall, M.D., &c, published in Washington City, 
1836 — a pamphlet of 48 pages. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 439 

arrested again in the pulpit, while on his knees, while another 
minister, Mr. Curtiss, was offering the concluding prayer. This 
was by authority of a writ issued by Moses Norris, Jr., Esq. 
lie was tried the same day, and sentenced to three months' 
hard labor in the House of Correction. He appealed from 
the sentence, and we find no further account of the pro- 
ceedings. 

These specimens of riotous demonstrations, connected with 
mockeries of legal proceedings, illustrate the nature, design, 
and moral affinities of the legislative and ecclesiastical at- 
tempts at gag-law, for which that precise period was distin- 
guished. They show us what was intended, what was well 
nigh accomplished, and what would have been the condition 
of liberty in America if the conspirators had succeeded. 

Capt. Jonathan Walker, a citizen of Massachusetts, for 
assisting the escape of a slave, was branded with a hot iron 
in the hand, the letters SS, by an officer of the United States ! 

Elijah P. Lovejoy was a native of Maine, a graduate of 
Waterville College, in 1828. Lie practiced law at St. Louis, 
Missouri, but, being desirous of entering the ministry, spent 
some time in preparatory study at Princeton, N. J. He was 
employed as an agent for the Sunday School Union, and was 
afterwards selected to conduct a religious paper at St. Louis. 
In this station he advocated the right of free discussion in 
opposition to the persecutors of Dr. Nelson. When a free 
colored man was burnt to death near St. Louis, he rebuked 
the savage outrage. For this he was obliged to leave the 
State, and located himself at Alton, Illinois, where, in July, 
1837, he avowed his sentiments as an abolitionist, and pub- 
lished a full declaration of his views in his "Alton Observer." 
This raised against him a storm of violence. Three several 
times were his press and office destroyed, before the fatal 
catastrophe, and three times were they replaced by the friends 
of liberty and law. At a public meeting, early in Novem- 
ber, ostensibly got up for the purpose of allaying the excite- 
ment, but really with the design to intimidate him and crush 
the liberty of the press, Mr. Lovejoy appeared, and, in a 



440 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

noble speech, defended his cause and his rights, "like Paul 
before Festus, or Luther at the Diet of Worms." 

On the arrival of his new press, it was lodged in a stone 
warehouse, and here Mr. Lovejoy and some of his friends 
stationed themselves, armed, apprehending an attack, which 
took place the same night. After several volleys of firing, an 
attempt was made to set fire to the building. Mr. Lovejoy 
went out to prevent their purpose, and soon fell, pierced with 
three buckshot. His companions effected their escape. This 
was on the 7th of November, 1837. 

Mr. Lovejoy left a widow and children. His wife had stood 
by him, like a heroine, when he was brutally assaulted, some 
time previous, at St. Charles. When the mother of Lovejoy 
heard of his death, she said, "It is well. I had rather he 
should fall a martyr to his cause than prove recreant to his 
principles." 

John B. Mahan, on requisition of Gov. Clark, of Kentucky, 
was delivered up by Gov. Vance, of Ohio, as a fugitive from 
justice, " going at large in the State of Ohio," to be tried on 
an indictment for assisting the escape of certain slaves. 

John B. Mahan was a citizen of Ohio, a local minister of 
the Methodist Episeopal Church, residing in Sardinia, Brown 
Co., Ohio, and had not been in Kentucky for nineteen years ! 
Yet he was given up by the Governor of Ohio, was arrested, at 
his residence, Sept. 17, 1888, torn from his family, hurried to 
Kentucky, and shut up in jail, without allowing him time to 
procure a writ of habeas (forpus, or summon evidence in his 
defense. He was tried at the Circuit Court of Kentucky, in 
Marion County, the 13th of November. It was admitted by 
the Attorney for the Commonwealth that the prisoner was a 
citizen of Ohio, and not in Kentucky at the time of the alleged 
offense ; yet he made an effort to procure his conviction. The 
jury returned a verdict of not guilty. A civil suit against 
him, for damages, was still left pending, to be tried the May 
following. The result of this suit we do not ascertain. 

Al anson Work, James E. Burr, and George Thompson, 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 441 

in July, 1841, were seized and imprisoned in Missouri, for at- 
tempting to assist the escape of some slaves. 

Alanson Work, a native of Connecticut, about 40 years old, 
having a wife and four children, was residing at the Mission 
Institute at Quincy, Illinois, for the sake of educating his chil- 
dren, and training them up for usefulness. James E. Burr 
and George Thompson were young students at that institute, 
preparing for the ministry. 

Quincy is separated by the river Mississippi from the slave 
state of Missouri. Ilaving crossed the river on an errand of 
mercy, these three men were seized and imprisoned. In Sep- 
tember they were tried, convicted, and sentenced to the Peni- 
tentiary at Jefferson City for twelve years. Ilere, their con- 
duct was such as to win for them many friends, and to com- 
mend their principles to the people of the surrounding coun- 
try. Their persecutors found it a matter of policy to get rid 
of their presence. Mr. Work was pardoned and released, Jan. 
20, 1846, Mr. Burr, Jan. .30, 1846, and Mr. Thompson, June 
14, 1846. Mr. Thompson was afterwards employed on a mis- 
sion to Africa, by the American Missionary Association. 

Charles Turner Torrey was born at Scituate, Mass... 
Nov. 21, 1813. He was educated at Yale College, and entered 
the Theological Seminary at Andoverin October, 1834, where 
he studied one year, and left the institution on account of ill- 
health. Completing his studies afterwards, under private tui- 
tion, he was licensed to preach by the Mendon (Mass.) Asso- 
ciation of Congregational Ministers, in October, 1836. In 
March, 1837, he was ordained pastor of a Congregational 
Church in Providence, E. I., and was married soon afterwards 
to a daughter of his theological instructor, Dr. Ide, of Medway. 
Miss Ide was a grand-daughter of the distinguished theolo- 
gian, Dr. Emmons. Leaving Providence, Mr. Torrey preached 
a while at Salem, Mass., in 1838, but in 1839 we find him in 
the less sedentary avocation of an anti-slavery lecturer. He 
had been an earnest abolitionist from the beginning of his min- 
istry, and in this active and laborious enterprise he was pre- 
eminently at home. He wrote much for the anti-slavery pa- 



442 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

pers, during his travels. The winter of 1841-2 he spent 
chiefly at Washington City as a reporter for several papers, 
and with a primary and special view to the interests of the 
anti-slavery cause. His writings were vigorous, rapid, bold, 
free, and discriminating. While at Washington, a Slavehold- 
er's Convention was held at Annapolis, Maryland, January, 
1842, and Mr. Torrey adventured to attend it, for the purpose 
of reporting the proceedings. But slavery shrinks, instinct- 
ively, from the penetrating eye of a freeman. He was exclu- 
ded from a seat among the reporters, afterwards forbidden to 
take notes in the gallery, and finally arrested and thrown into 
prison. A few days afterwards, on a judicial examination, he 
was released on giving bail in $500 to " keep the peace'' till 
April, and returned to his post at Washington. 

In the autumn of 1842, Mr. Torrey became editor of the 
" Tocsin of Liberty," afterwards the " Albany Patriot." While 
engaged in this work he was entreated by a fugitive from 
slavery, to go to Virginia, and assist him bring his wife out 
of bondage. He could not refuse. This undertaking was a 
failure and they narrowly escaped arrest. It led Mr. Torrey, 
however, into other and more successful enterprises of the 
same character, but which, ultimately, cost him his liberty and 
his life. 

His arrest took place June 24, 1844. He was thrown into 
jail at Baltimore. Finding it certain that he could not have 
a fair trial, he made an unsuccessful attempt to escape from 
confinement. His trial came on November 29, 1844. He 
was convicted, as he affirmed, on evidence of perjured wit- 
nesses, who testified that they saw what they did not see* 
He learned, what Judge Jeremie had certified before, and what 
has been verified since, that in all trials of this kind, any re- 
quisite amount of false testimony is always at hand ! He was 



* Of course, it is not denied that Mr. Torrey was instrumental in releasing many 
slaves. But this does not alter the fact, that the witnesses in the present case per- 
jured themselves. As a specimen, one of them testified that he had seen the prisoner 
at the residence of his (Torrey's) mother,' in Hereford County, Maryland ! The 
mother of Mr. Torrey died in Massachusetts when he was a child ! 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 443 

fonvicted, and sentenced to hard labor in the penitentiary for 
six years. To this place he was removed the 30th of Decem- 
1 844. Great efforts were made to procure his pardon. 
His father-in-law, Dr. Ide, made a visit to the Governor of 
Maryland, for the purpose. It was all in vain. Lie died in 
the penitentiary, May 9, 1846, of a lingering consumption, the 
effect of his confinement. Such are the tender mercies of 
slaveholders. The God of the oppressed, the avenger of the 
widow and the fatherless, will remember them. The murder- 
ers of Torrey and of Lovejoy arc alike guilty in his sight. 

The most fiend-like expression of hatred against Torrey 
and against the holy cause in which he was enlisted, remains 
to be told. On the arrival of his remains at Boston, the res- 
idence of his brother-in-law, Mr. Ide, and where the widow 
and children of Torrey, with her parents had come to attend 
the funeral solemnities, arrangements had been made, on leave 
duly obtained, to hold the services in the meeting-house of 
the Park Street Congregational Church, in which Mr. Ide was 
a stated worshiper. A Congregational minister, Mr. Love- 
joy (brother of the martyr) was selected to preach on the oc- 
casion. Mr. Torrey had lived and died an orthodox Congre- 
gational minister in good and regular standing, and no heresy 
or misconduct had been imputed to him except his excessive 
sympathy for the poor slave. Dr. Ide, like his father-in-law, 
Emmons, who had died about six years previous, was among 
the most honored Congregational ministers in the common- 
wealth. Who could have believed that arrangements so ap- 
propriate would have been broken up, by a refusal to allow 
tltc house to be used on such an occasion? But so it was ! The 
corpse of the martyred Torrey was denied, what would not 
have been denied to the worst of malefactors — the decencies 
of a temporary resting-place in the house of prayer during the 
accustomed religious exercises of such an occasion. This 
single incident will suffice, centuries hence, to certify the po- 
sition held by the leading religious influences of the orthodox 
Congregational sect in Boston, in the great struggle for chris- 



444 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

tian liberty, in the nineteenth century in America.* The 
Tremont Temple (Baptist) was opened for the occasion, and 
the services appropriately performed. This was followed by 
a public meeting in Faneuil Hall, and commemoration meet- 
ings and funeral discourses, all over the free states. From 
across the water, the voice of British Christianity, us repre- 
sented by the Anti-Slavery Committee in London, and attest 
ed by the world-honored signature of the aged Clarkson, 
brought expressions of sympathy for the " widow and orphan 
children " of Torrey, and admonition to " every section of 
the professedly Christian Church in the United States to sep- 
arate itself from all participation in, or sanction of the system 
of slavery."f 

He died in the 83d year of his age. Though few men 
have made a deeper impression upon society in so brief a life, 
his various powers both of thought and of accomplishment 
were little known and little developed, in comparison with 
what they would have been had his life been prolonged. He 
was a man of genius as well as of 'rare courage. His little 
book "Home, or the Pilgrim's Faith Revived"- — however 
some may dislike its old fashioned Puritan theology — is 
among the few sketches of the kind that will live. " It will 
be matter of astonishment to all who read this book of two 
hundred and fifty-five pages, that it should have been written 
by a prisoner in twelve days." This was in the interim 
between the verdict against him and the sentence of the 
Court. 

This place may be a proper one for the remark that while 
the commonly recognized leaders and great men among the 



* We could wish that the same spirit had not been witnessed in other places than 
Boston. The meeting-house of the Richmond-Street Congregational Church, in 
Providence, R. I., of which Mr. Torrey had been pastor, was not permitted to be 
opened for a sermon commemorating his death ! Very few, in the comparison with 
the whore, was the number of Congregational churches in the cities whose houses 
could be occupied for such services. Is it strange that some abolitionists connected 
with such churches should secede from them ? 

t Memoir of tlie Martyr Torrey, by J. C. Lovejoy. Boston: J. P. Jewett & 
Co, 1847. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 445 

American clergy have disgraced themselves, the ministry, 
the churches, and the religion they profess, by the coarse 
they have taken on the slave question, and while the great 
majority of inferior men in the ministry have servilely fol- 
lowed in their wake, adding much to the multiplied mischiefs 
of their unfaithfulness, there has nevertheless been a noble 
band of true christian ministers, (though few in comparison with 
the great body) who have been among the most self-sacrificing 
ami efficient laborers in the cause of freedom. Not only 
should the more distinguished be honorably mentioned, but 
a much greater number of equally laborious though more 
obscure ministers of Christ, who, in their retired places, have 
done what they could, though known only in their own nar- 
| row circles, or where they have sojourned or traveled. They 
' have been driven, for support, from parish to parish, some- 
times have itinerated as lecturers, and sometimes have been 
driven out of the ministry, as a stated avocation, altogether, 
resorting to other means of subsistence, and patiently suffer- 
I ing out their pilgrimage, as they best could. The rectified 
vision of a future age may recognize in these " the salt of 
the earth," who have preserved the true Church. 

General William L. Chaplin, a lawyer by profession, a 
native of Groton, Massachusetts, a citizen of the State of 
New York, since 1837, and frequently spending the winters 
in Washington City, is too well known to the friends and 
the enemies of American liberty to require a biographical 
sketch in this volume. As a lecturer, as an editor, as a re- 
porter of proceedings in Congress, as a leader, and as a candi- 
date for office, in the Liberty party, he has an established 
reputation among the public men of his times. 

Gen. Chaplin was arrested, sometime in August, 1850, by 
the police of Washington City, though out of their appropriate 
jurisdiction, and within the borders of Maryland. It was in 
the night season ; his carriage wheels were blocked, he was 
knocked from his seat, conveyed back into the city, and 
thrown into prison, on the charge of carrying away slaves. 
The Governor of Maryland also made a requisition on the 



446 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

Federal Executive, for the delivery of Chaplin, to be tried 
for an assault committed in that State. Having been bailed 
in the District, in the sum of six thousand dollars, he was 
immediately conveyed to Maryland, and imprisoned at Eock- 
ville, where he remained until the latter part of December, 
when he was released on the extravagant bail of nineteen 
thousand dollars, which was raised by his friends in the free 
states. After all this, there have been intimations that he 
would be demanded by the Governor of Maryland ! 

Messrs. Drayton andSAYRES, citizens "of the free North," 
are now, (June, 1852) incarcerated in Washington City, for 
the alleged crime of assisting 74 or 76 slaves to escape from 
Maryland in the schooner Pearl, which was seized in the 
waters of Maryland, in April, 1848. They were convicted 
on 75 indictments. The prosecution was conducted by Fran- 
cis S. Key, Esq., who, " in disregard of usage," procured 
their indictment for "stealing slaves" after having failed to 
obtain, a verdict against them for larceny. — National Era, Hay 
81, 1849. 

* 






SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 447 



CHAPTER XXXVII. 

OF THE ELEMENTS AND OCCASIONS OF DIVISION AMONG 
ABOLITIONISTS. 

Unity in measures the result of unity in principles — Complex problem before Amer- 
ican Abolitionists — Their points of agreement and of disagreement — Natural 
variety of measures and of organization — Change of views incident to reformatory 
experiment — Actual changes in most abolitionists and of opposite schools — These 
changes described — Division naturally followed. 

In common with the Protestant Reformers, and many other 
earnest men of progress, the abolitionists of America suffer 
the reproach of being divided among themselves. There may 
be a great fault in this ; but the fault may lie in another 
direction than is commonly supposed, and in things that 
seldom fall under censure. It is easy to say that reformers 
should be united and present an unbroken front to the com- 
mon enemy. So they should. They should be "perfectly 
joined together in the same mind and judgment." They 
should "all speak the same thing," and do the same work. 

In other words, they should harmonize in their principles 
and their measures. Unless they do harmonize in their prin- 
ciples, they cannot harmonize in their measures^that is, if 
they are what all reformers should be, earnest, honest, con- 
sistent, conscience-controlled, God-fearing men. The harmony 
that grows out of compromises of principles, is worse than 
useless, in any moral reform. 

Or, if expedients instead of principles be proposed as a 
basis of co-operation, the result will commonly be a still 
greater diversity of judgment. Men's sense of right and 
wrong are less various than their calculations of advantage and 



448 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

disadvantage. Anything but unity comes of running after 
mere expedients. 

It lias been asked why American abolitionists should be 
distracted by divisions any more than British abolitionists 
were. Many answers might be given,* but we choose, first, 
to demand what progress was made by all that unity of Brit- 
ish abolitionists that preceded their unity in correct principles 
and in measures growing out of them ? What trophies are 
to be shown of the unity in which the principles of Granville 
Sharp were held in virtual abeyance by a co-operation with 
the wrong principles then acted upon by Wilberforce and 
Clarkson ? 

Reformers should all and always be agreed. That is to 
say, the profound problems of human nature, of moral philoso- 
phy, of theology, -and of ethics, should be correctly solved 
and acted upon by them. It ought to have been done, doubt- 
less, long ago. And the reforms still before us should have 
been consummated accordingly. The world waits, and must 
wait, for reformers to unite in acting according to correct 
principles, before the world can be reformed. Right measures 
grow out of right ethics. And all systems of ethics have 
their theological foundations. 

It is easy to deride abstractionists, and to extol practical 
business men. But who are practical business men, except 
those who honor the laws of nature and of God, in the activi- 
ties they put forth ? The steam-ship, the rail-car, the mag- 
netic telegraph — could any array of numbers, could any 
expenditure of funds have reached the results of these, if a . 
compromise requiring a departure from the laws of nature 
(the laws of God) had been deemed requisite, or had been 
consented to, in order to obtain the men, or the means, or to 
purchase patronage ? 

* In England, the Slave Power had not taken entire possession of the high places 
of the Church and of the State. The wide Atlantic separated the mass of the slave- 
holders from the British Legislature, the British Cabinet, the British throne, the 
British Church, whether " established" or " dissenting." The plans and modes of 
operation first agreed upon among abolitionists, were therefore found adequate to 
overcome opposition. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 449 

You see a delicate and complicated machine, a chronometer, 
oat of order. You see half a dozen "reformers" debating the 
principle upon which the machine is constructed, and the con- 
sequent measures of repair. Will you exhort them to unity 
of action in repairing, without waiting for any agreement in 
the principle upon which the action must proceed ? 

Society, the Church, the State, legislation, jurisprudence — 
here are machines quite as delicate, and requiring as much 
study as a chronometer. The principle, in both cases, may 
be very simple. But it needs to be understood, and applied. 
When abolitionists first commenced their labors, they did 
not know how completely the Slave Power had controlled, 
and how much it had marred, deranged, and subverted, our 
whole social machinery — the Church, the State, the Constitu- 
tion, the laws, the judiciary — everything which they hoped 
and expected to wield for the overthrow of the slave system. 
The implements of their warfare were out of order — the ma- 
chinery did not work. Or rather, it worked only in the wrong 
direction. What was to be done ? 

The Church, the Ministry, the State, the Constitution, 
legislation, jurisprudence, religion, law — what are all these? 
"What is to be done with them ? 

We sought from them assistance, guidance, light, order, pro- 
tection, defense. But behold, opposition, confusion, darkness, 
injury, invasion! Are they perverted? or are they only 
doing their appropriate work ? Are they to be rescued and 
wielded ? or are they to be abandoned, repudiated, and over- 
thrown? 

Different answers would be likely to be given to these ques- 
tions, especially as abolitionists were men of diverse theolo- 
gies and conflicting politics ; and some of them, perhaps, had 
given to neither theology nor politics any very consecutive 
attention, but had become abolitionists from instinctive sym- 
pathy and impulse. 

Other problems besides the slave question might have a 
bearing on the decision. If the principles of peace or non- 
resistance were so held and embraced by one class of aboli- 

29 



450 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

tionists as to preclude an approving recognition of any civil 
government operating by physical compulsion, or the sanc- 
tions of penal law, a foundation would be laid for a course in 
respect to political action, widely different from any that could 
consistently or conscientiously be pursued by those holding 
to the opposite theory. 

Just so of the Church. If the idea of individuality were 
carried so far by some, as to suggest the inutility and mis- 
chiefs of all regularly established church organizations, there 
would, of necessity, arise corresponding views of reformatory 
measures in relation to the Church, which men of other theo- 
ries could not reasonably be expected to patronize. 

If the question of slave emancipation be considered (as it 
commonly is in America) one phase of the broader question 
of human equality and inalienable rights, it might come to 
suggest the question of woman's entire equality and identity 
of position with man, and thus another problem, perhaps an 
intricate one, might present itself, in respect to which the 
friends of slave emancipation might differ. 

That questions of this nature had more or less to do with 
divisions among abolitionists, it would be in vain to deny. 
Equally plain is it that these questions had a strong inherent 
tendency to produce division, whatever may be said of the 
possibility of avoiding a rupture. 

So far as abolitionists were agreed in their principles, so far, 
but no farther, could they consistently agree in their measures. 
It is in vain to anathematize non-conformity, and to call it 
bigotry, illiberality, and prejudice. No bigotry is more nar- 
row and intolerant than that which would enforce a unity of 
measures without a unity in the principles upon which they 
must be founded. The body of men who demand that I shall 
adopt their creed, are not more arrogant, and are much less 
unreasonable, than another body that condescendingly per- 
mits me to retain my creed, but denounces me as a bigot or a 
disorganizer because I hesitate to patronize the measures which 
nothing but the adoption of their oicn creed could warrant or 
justify. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 451 

Abolitionists were and still are agreed in respect to the in- 
herent criminality of slaveholding, the duty and safety of 
immediate and unconditional emancipation, the right of the 
slave to liberation on the soil, and of the free people of color to 
remain in the land of their birth or of their choice, in the full 
possession and exercise of their equal rights as men, and as 
American citizens. In the promulgation of these sentiments, 
and in the answering of objections against them, all abolition- 
ists could agree ; and for a time they found themselves suffi- 
ciently occupied with this labor. 

But as assuredly as they made much progress, the time 
would soon come — and it did come — when the majority of 
abolitionists felt other work pressing on their hands. When 
a large body of the people were convinced of the truths abo- 
litionists had taught them, the question arose, How shall they 
best be led to put their principles in practice ? Some of them 
felt themselves to be, by the act, the ordinance, and the Pro- 
vidence of God, a part and parcel of the State and Nation in 
which they resided, holding political power themselves, and 
sharers in the responsibilities thus resting upon them. These 
had work to do in which those who held opposite views of 
civil Government could not be expected to co-operate — a 
work from which others had no right to deter them. Just so, 
those who were members of organized churches, and who be- 
lieved church organizations to be proper and Heaven-ap- 
pointed institutions for religious activity and culture, found 
a work before them in which those of other and opposite views 
could not participate, and could not be supposed to be the 
best advisers. 

It was not enough to say that abolitionists, as individuals, 
were left at liberty to pursue their own course of political and 
ecclesiastical action, yet retaining their connection with an 
anti-slavery society composed of men of all political and reli- 
gious views, and even administered and directed by those 
holding to no measures of political or ecclesiastical operation. 
All this might be plausible, and even possible, in the exercise 
of great mutual forbearance and candor. But it would still 



452 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

remain true that no mere isolated individual action without 
co-operation in some way, could suffice for those who intended 
to pursue ecclesiastical and especially political action against 
slavery. Organization among themselves, in some form, 
might be quite as important there as in the Anti-Slavery So- 
ciety. Those who thought so, had, at least, the right to act 
in accordance with their convictions. Be it so, that their con- 
nection with the Anti-Slavery Society might have been re- 
tained. The progress of the cause would inevitably require, 
in their view, the greater part of their efforts and means to be 
expended in some form of definite action which the Anti- 
Slavery Society, if confined to mere " moral suasion" (as un- 
derstood by many,) could not be expected to endorse. The 
diminished operations of such societies, even without a rup- 
ture, would have been the inevitable result. But, for this 
state of things, the leading men in the societies might not be 
prepared — and might regard it as an evil, to be counteracted 
and opposed ; perhaps vehemently denounced. 

Aside from such differences of principles, among abolition- 
ists, it is easy to see that unexpected occurrences, a change of 
position, and habits of observation and inquiry, might intro- 
duce widely different views of the policy proper to be pursued. 
And these different views might lay a foundation for a diver- 
sity of organizations. The jealousy of centralized power, so 
common among friends of liberty, would tend to a similar 
result. 

The preceding suggestions, it is believed, will furnish a clue 
to the divisions among American abolitionists. When they 
formed the American Anti-Slavery Society, and adopted a 
Constitution and a Declaration of Sentiment, at Philadelphia, 
in 1833, there appeared to be an agreement in their principles, 
and in their understanding of the prominent facts of the case. 
This laid a foundation for an agreement in their measures, 
and, consequently,, for an unity of organization. 

They were agreed in their views of civil government and of 
its legitimate powers. They were agreed in the following de- 
claration of their duty as citizens : 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 453 

" There are at the present time the highest obligations resting upon the 
people of the free states, to remove slavery, by moral and political action, 
as prescribed in the Constitution of the United States." 

They appear to have been substantially agreed in their con- 
struction of the Federal Constitution. While they repudiated 
the ultra Southern construction, they nevertheless admitted 
" the compromises " as commonly understood and conceded, 
at that time, in the non-slaveholding States. They disclaimed 
the idea of a direct interference of the Federal Government 
to abolish slavery in the States, though they insisted that it 
should, in no way, support slavery or extend it anywhere, 
but abolish it in the Federal District and Territories, and in- 
terdict the inter-state slave trade. This, they then thought, 
would secure the general abolition of slavery, by State action, 
and with this they were content. Into any close scrutiny of 
the Constitution they had not gone. 

Anticipating, as they did, the speedy co-operation of the 
principal religious sects in the free States, and of a majority 
of one or both the great political parties, they contemplated 
no measures of separation from either of them — no political 
or ecclesiastical organizations of their own. Their disclaimers 
of any such intention were honest, and were continued for a 
long time. Connected with this, to a great extent, was the 
vague notion, so generally entertained, that a religious and 
moral question was too sacred to be mingled with politics. 
And yet, as has been seen, they contemplated, in some way, 
" political" as well as "moral action." 

They seem also to have been agreed in their views of the 
proper action of females. Though many earnest and gifted 
ladies were present at the sittings of the Convention at Phila- 
delphia, when the Society was formed, and some of them (on 
invitation) suggested amendments of the "Declaration," yet 
no one of them became members or officers of the Convention 
or of the Society. By common consent, the separate organi- 
zation of Female Anti-slavery Societies was recommended, 
then, and for some time afterwards. 

These statements are made here for no other object than to 



45-4 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

record the simple facts of the case, and to show the position 
of the Society at the beginning. Whether deviations from 
this course have been wise or unwise, is not the point now in 
hand. But the fact of deviation, by somebody, connects it- 
self with the fact of division. Without a change, no division 
would have occurred. 

The truth is, a very small portion of abolitionists, if any, 
at the present time, occupy precisely the original ground as 
above described. If any organization does now occupy that 
ground, in every particular mentioned, it probably represents 
but a very small minority of American abolitionists. 

Deviations have taken place ; and the history of them is 
the history of division. The mere fact of change criminates 
no one, and the record of it should give no offense. 

Some changed their views in respect to the proper methods 
of female co-operation, and wished to change their usages ac- 
cordingly. 

Some changed their views in respect to the practicability 
of obtaining legislative action against slavery, through the 
instrumentality of the old political parties, and therefore de- 
sired the organization of a new one. 

Some, on investigation, changed their views of the Federal 
Constitution, and, believing it to contain no "guaranties" of 
slavery, but a distinct guaranty of free institutions, they could 
no longer continue to concede those pro-slavery guaranties, 
but, on the other hand, demanded that the " guaranty " of 
Eepublican State Governments should be redeemed, and ren- 
dered available. 

Some changed their views of the Constitution in the op- 
posite direction — perhaps changed twice ; — repudiating, in 
the first place, "the compromises," and holding the Constitu- 
tion (as did N. P. Eogers) to be thoroughly anti-slavery— and 
then (assenting to the pro-slavery construction) denouncing 
it, very consistently, as a "covenant with death, and an agree- 
ment with hell." 

Some changed their views of the prospect of divorcing their 
churches and other ecclesiastical bodies from slavery, and 






SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 455 

therefore wished to withdraw from them, and form other 
ecclesiastical organizations better conformed to their own 
ideas of thg Christian religion. 

Some changed their views in respect to the propriety of 
any compulsory civil government, making use of physical 
compulsion. On this ground they could not, themselves, con- 
scientiously vote or hold office, and they could not but desire, 
as earnest men, to draw other philanthropists into their own 
views and methods. 

Some changed their views in respect to the value of all or- 
ganized Church institutions, (whether pro-slavery or anti- 
slavery) and the desirableness of their being sustained by the 
friends of humanity. It would be a libel on such to insinuate 
that their activities and their influence would not correspond 
with their convictions. 

It may be said that this influence concerning civil govern- 
ment and Church organizations, was not exerted by them " as 
abolitionists," nor " on the anti-slavery platform." This state- 
ment might be either conceded or questioned, (as some do 
question it) but the main fact, as before stated, would remain. 
We reproach no one. "We only record the facts. 

And, finally, a long time afterwards, some changed their 
views in respect to the moral obligation of directing their 
political activities, and wielding their right of suffrage, in 
such a manner as to sustain no statesmen except those pledged 
to the abolition of slavery. They therefore consented, as will 
be seen, to a political platform less rigid, and permitting the 
support of those who only promised to oppose the extension 
of slavery. 

In respect to this last item — perhaps some of the others — 
some who admit that they occupy the ground described, may 
say also (and say truly) that they have not changed. But, the 
majority, doubtless, under each specification, have changed. 

In recording these general facts, with the particulars that 
may follow, the writer understands that he treads on delicate 
ground. Each party mentioned would, perhaps, wish him to 
modify some part of the record — to add something — or erase 



456 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

something from the statement. It is, perhaps, difficult, for 
one who has been an earnest actor in such scenes, to write the 
history of them without some bias. We claim no exemption 
from such influences, and can only promise our best efforts at, 
impartiality and fairness, consoling ourselves with the thought 
that no one but an earnest actor would be likely to see clearly 
all that is to be seen. We must write as we see, and must 
see with our own eyes, — leaving it with others to judge, and 
to write, too, if they shall think fit. 






SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 457 



CHAPTER XXXVIII. 
divisions in 1839-40. 

Division in the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society, in 1839, at Boston — Circum- 
stances connected with or preceding it — Division in the Parent Society in 1840, at 
New York — Its attendant circumstances and results — General neutrality of aboli- 
tionists in tho interior — Distinct origin (and from other causes) of the Liberty 
Tarty. 

A division in the Massachusetts Anti-slavery Society took 
place at Boston, in May, 1839. The Liberty Party was regu- 
larly organized by a Convention at Albany, N. Y., April 1, 
1840. A division in the American Anti-slavery Society, oc- 
curred in New York, in May, 1840. 

The division at New York appears to have been connected, 
more or less, with the division at Boston. 

By Mr. Garrison and his associates, the organization of the 
Libert}^ Party has been regarded as only one form of the op- 
position made to their State and Na^onal Societies, by those 
who separated from them. 

The writer thinks them mistaken in the general fact, (ad- 
mitting, perhaps, local exceptions) and that the Liberty Party 
was projected in the interior of the State of New York, by 
those who had not entered at all into the dissentions in Bos- 
ton and New York. We must briefly notice the prominent 
facts. 

THE DIVISION IN MASSACHUSETTS. 

It was in Boston that the Liberator of William Lloyd Gar- 
rison was published — for a season as the organ of the Massa- 
chusetts. Anti-slavery Society — and afterwards (when com- 



458 GKEAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

plaints were made of his introduction of other topics, and of 
the expression of sentiments obnoxious to some abolitionists) 
its publication was resumed in his own name, and on his own 
account. Officially, or in form, the difficulty was obviated, 
but the prominence of Mr. Garrison, as an abolitionist, through- 
out the country, and his official connection with the Massa- 
chusetts Anti-slavery Society, appeared, in the minds of some, 
to identify his peculiar views with the anti-slavery cause, to 
its injury. Such persons were still annoyed with the con- 
tinued appearance, in the Liberator, of the views they deemed 
so objectionable. They conceived that the Society was coming 
under their influence, and that its activities were in process of 
becoming mis-directed and injurious. 

It was in Boston, therefore, that the first division took 
place. 

Among the new views objected against, were the principles 
of " Non-Resistants," so called, who had organized a " Non- 
Resistance Society," and established a paper promulgating 
their views, in addition to the advocacy they received in the 
Liberator. The definition of "non-resistance," as gathered 
from the writings of its advocates, included, not merely the 
absence of war, of military armaments, and of " the death 
penalty," but, likewise, if w r e have rightly understood it, of 
all physical coercion in a way of punishment by civil govern- 
ment ; the absence, consequently, of all that is commonly 
understood by the term, penal law. This view connected it- 
self, then, and afterwards, with the peculiar theological tenets 
of those who had, for a long time previous, promulgated 
similar views of the Divine administration here or here- 
after. 

Political action, by voting, even for the abolition of slavery, 
under a civil government based on physical force, could not 
but be regarded as sinful by those who held, consistently, 
these new views. Such was indeed the fact. The inference 
was not merely admitted, but avowed and insisted on. For a 
long time, and on this ground alone, did this peculiar class of 
abolitionists decline and discountenance voting, before they 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 459 

raised any objection to voting on the ground of the pro- 
slavery character of the Constitution of the United States — be- 
fore, indeed, some of them seem to have discovered those traits 
of that document which have since become so palpable and 
manifest to them. 

Here, then, was a division among the abolitionists of Mas- 
sachusetts, in fact, in respect to their measures, before there 
was any division, in organization. What some of them re- 
garded a most solemn Christian duty, others of them regarded 
a malum in se — a sin ! 

Another question resulting in division, appears to have 
been that concerning the proper position of females. The 
u Pastoral Letter," before mentioned, sent forth by the Asso- 
ciation of Congregational Ministers in Massachusetts, in 1837, 
had strongly censured the public lectures of females. This 
created a re-action, and drew forth strong and startling as- 
sertions of "woman's rights." A "clerical appeal," signed 
by five Congregational pastors, in the ranks of the abolition- 
ists, but on the side of the "Pastoral Letter" of 1837, in- 
creased greatly the excitement. In this " clerical appeal " 
there was manifested a strong sympathy for the pro-slavery 
portion of the clergy — a disposition to shelter them from the 
censures of abolitionists — and an effort to sustain them in 
their claims of high clerical authority. A very able reply to 
the "clerical appeal" was promptly issued by Eev. Amos A. 
Phelps, of the same religious denomination, who, afterwards, 
in the division, did not go with Mr. Garrison, and never em- 
braced his peculiar views. The signers of the " clerical ap- 
peal," and those who agreed with them, would, of course, 
separate themselves from Mr. Garrison in the division that 
followed. But the case of Mr. Phelps' shows that a division 
from Mr. Garrison and his associates afforded no certain evi- 
dence of sympathy for the appellants, or approbation of their 

" appeal." 

The editorial tone of the Liberator, in the mean time, was 
spirited and stirring. The assaults of the " Pastoral Letter" 
and of the " Clerical Appeal" were not merely parried, in a 



460 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

way of self-defense. In such, a warfare, not even " Non-Re- 
sistants" were to be restrained from aggressive and even retali- 
atory movements. The body of the " orthodox clergy" with 
a few exceptions, were regarded by them as the aggressors, 
and that, too, in a bad cause. The most provoking as well as 
the most alarming feature of the assault was, that it had been 
successful in bringing to its aid a portion of the clergy that 
held rank among abolitionists. " What is this clerical institu- 
tion ? Where is its charter ? What are its claims ? And 
what is the theology that lends it its sanction?" Questions 
like these must have arisen. Mr. Garrison was earnest and 
ardent. The distinctions between an institution and its per- 
version — between an office and its incumbent — between " or- 
thodoxy" and the supposed conservators and expounders of 
orthodoxv, were very intelligible distinctions. Mr. Garrison 
may have lacked neither the discriminative powers nor the 
magnanimity to understand and admit them. Yet he may 
not have been in the best mood or position, at the moment, to 
perceive, to appreciate, or to inquire after them. The first 
impulse, if followed, would naturally be — " Is ikis the institu- 
tion of the ministry ? Then, away with it ! Is this ortho- 
doxy ? Let it fall." The Liberator, about this time, abounded 
in sneers against the " clergy" — against "orthodoxy" and the 
"orthodox." It questioned or denied the obligation of ob- 
serving the first day of the week, as the Sabbath. It broached 
speculations concerning the "law" and the "decalogue," as 
contrasted with "the gospel 1 ' — which, to many ears, conveyed 
an impression of speculative antinomianism. In all this, 
though connected {contrasted as some thought) with his terribly 
" orthodox" denunciations of the Divine wrath against op- 
pressors and their apologists, there was much to alarm, per- 
plex, and alienate a class of Kew England minds that had, 
until then, been warmly and affectionately drawn to him. 
He could not have intended to repel the " orthodox" aboli- 
tionists around him — nor to do them or their theology injus- 
tice. But his editorials seem to have had that effect. No 
protestations that his " anti-slavery platform was broad enough 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 4G1 

for men of all creeds," served to satisfy them. They felt that 
there was a want of sympathy and confidence towards those 
of their creed — that to be " orthodox" was to lie under suspi- 
cion of latent pro-slaveryism.* In the mean time, those of 
other theological views clustered naturally around Mr. Garri- 
son ; attracted, in some cases, it may be, by his warfare with 
" the orthodox," as well as by his warfare with slavery. From 
about this time, we date the change that came over the theo- 
logical sentiments of Mr. Garrison, who, in 1880, is known to 
have been rigidly " orthodox" himself, having been educated 
in the sentiments of orthodox Baptists and being a warm ad- 
mirer of the Puritans. f 

Differences in theology, having a bearing on ethics, on politics, 
and on reformatory measures, and, especially, theological jeal- 
ousies, mutually entertained, may therefore be reckoned, to a cer- 
tain extent and degree, an element of division among the aboli- 
tionists of Massachusetts. We will not say that, in this, cither 
party has been wholly free from blame. Yet it is evident that 
a theology that places the ballot-box and the yoke of slavery 
in the same category, could hardly be expected to shape anti- 
slavery measures for those who believed in the divine institu- 
tion of civil government and the political responsibilities of 
the citizens. 

In April, 1839, a iicav paper called the Massachusetts Abo- 
litionist, and conducted by Elizur Wright, Jr., (formerly Cor- 
responding Secretary of the American Anti-Slavery Society, 
and Editor of the Anti-Slavery Quarterly Magazine,) was com- 
menced in Boston. 

A new State Society, called the Massachusetts Abolition 
Society, was organized in Boston, the 27th of May, in the 
same year. 

The new paper and the new society based the movement 
on their views of the- importance of political action — views not 



* We find Benjamin Lundy, a Quaker, expressing in bis paper, bis regret that the 
course of Mr. Garrison tended to introduce sectarian divisions among abolitionists. 

+ Mr. Garrison is not, and never has- boen a Quaker, as many,, at a distance, bavo 
supposed. 



462 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

held by the Editor of the Liberator, and by other leading 
members of the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society. Yet it 
does not appear that, at that time, the leaders of the new 
movement contemplated the organization of a separate politi- 
cal party. 

The Old (Massachusetts Anti-Slavery) Society affirmed, in 
a manifesto sent out on the occasion, that so lately as the 10th 
of August previous, the Board of Managers had urged politi- 
cal action, that fourteen out of eighteen members of the Board 
believed in " the duty of upholding civil government at the 
polls," and that they doubted whether one-hundredth part of 
the members of the Society held the peculiar views of Mr. 
Garrison.* 

To this, it was responded that such facts furnished a strong 
argument against the tone of the only anti-slavery paper in 
the state, seeking and receiving anti-slavery support — that, at 
least, so large a majority of Massachusetts abolitionists were 
justified, in establishing a paper that advocated instead of op- 
posing the political measures they approved : and that they 
were called upon to organize an anti-slavery society in which, 
without contention, they could advocate " the duty of uphold- 
ing civil government" and likewise of abolishing slavery "at 
the polls." 

DIVISION IN THE PARENT SOCIETY. 

A few days before the consummation of this rupture in Bos- 
ton, a kindred dispute had been introduced, May 7, 1839, into 
the business meeting of the American Anti-slavery Society in 
the city of New York. Two points of disagreement were pre- 
sented; the one related to the co-operation of females; the 
other to the duty of political action. 

A question arose whether the roll of the meeting should, as 
on former occasions, be composed only of the names of men, 



* This statement, in making the same argument, was repeated long afterward. In 
1841 or 2, it was alleged that there were not, probably, to exceed one or two hundred 
" Non-Rosistauts" in all New-England. 



SLAYKUY A XI) FREEDOM. 463 

or whether it should include also those of women* The yeas 
and nays were taken, from which it appears that the delegates 
from Massachusetts gave 72 ayes and 25 nays ; state of New 
York, 45 ayes, 76 nays; Connecticut, 14 ayes, 11 nays; Penn- 
sylvania, 21 ayes, 7 nays; llhode Island, 10 ayes, 1 nay; other 
States, 18 ayes, 20 nays— Total, 180 ayes, 140 nays. Majority, 
in favor of enrolling names of women, 40. 

On the list of ayes we notice several prominent names after- 
wards conspicuous in the Liberty party, and not in sympathy 
with the distinctive views of Mr. Garrison, viz: Alvan Stew- 
art, Eev. Joshua Leavitt, Gerrit Smith, Win. L. Chaplin, Rev. 
Cyrus P. Grosvcnor, A. F. Williams, S. M. Booth, Rev. Otis 
Thompson, Rev. Francis Hawley, Rev. Samuel Wells, &c. &c. 
Several of them " orthodox" ministers of the gospel. f 

A resolution Avas reported, containing the former testimo- 
nies of the society, on " the duty of political action," nearly in 
the language of the Declaration of 1833, as then drawn up by 
Mr. Garrison. Mr. C. C. Burleigh moved an amendment, to the 
effect that those who use the elective franchise and neglect to 
use it for the cause of emancipation, are false to their princi- 
ples, and fail to do their duty. The result was 84 votes for 
the original resolution, and 77 against it. 

The annual meeting of the society at New York, in May, 
1840, resulted in a division : — the election of new officers for 
the Old Society, and the organization of the "American and 
Foreign Anti-Slavery Society;" the former in accordance with 
the view r s of Mr. Garrison; the latter, with the co-operation 
of Messrs. Arthur and Lewis Tappan.:}: 

The majority of those in attendance at the " business meet- 

* On the one hand, it was claimed that the Constitution of the Society made no 
discrimination between males and females. On the other, it was urged that the uni- 
form usage indicated the original intentions of the society. 

t Alvan Stewart moved the appointment of a Committee to reply to the protest 
filed against the vote, but the motion was laid on the table. 

t Mr. Arthur Tappan, in anticipation of the controversy, absented himself from 
the " business meeting." He was re-elected President of the Old Society, and de- 
clined serving, but accepted the Presidency of the newly formed American and 
Foreign Anti-Slavery Society. 



464 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

ing," appeared to have been from New England, mostly from 
Massachusetts; many were females from particular localities 
where the peculiar views of Mr. Garrison were known to be 
prevalent. Arrangements had been made for the cheap con- 
veyance of the company by steamboat. The Liberator said : 

" On making an enumeration, it appeared that there were about four hun- 
dred and fifty anti-slavery men and women in our company, of whom 
about four hundred were from Massachusetts. Probably one hundred went 
by other routes.'''' 

This would make 550 in all. The proceedings afterwards 
showed only 1008 recorded votes, from all in attendance, from 
all the States. Of these, Mr. Garrison's rally of 550 would, 
if unanimous, secure a majority of 92 without any votes 
from any of the other States. Yet the business to be trans- 
acted was that of a Society scattered in all the free States, 
and numbering, perhaps, one or two hundred thousand, 
the majority of whom anticipated nothing of what was going 
forward; and, if they had known, could have had no oppor- 
tunity of attending. 

On the motion to insert the name of Abby Kelly on a com- 
mittee, 557 votes were given in favor, and 451 against the 
appointment, a majority of 106. The women who came in 
company with Mr. Garrison, and voted with him, were more 
than enough to secure a majority. 

Resolutions were adopted disapproving the Liberty Party 
Nominating Convention at Albany, the April previous, dis- 
approving of anti-slavery nominations in general, and depre- 
cating, in the same sentence, and without distinction, the 
support of Harrison, Van Buren, and Birney ; — the latter be- 
ing an abolitionist who had emancipated his slaves, and the 
two former opposers of the anti-slavery movement. The con- 
sistency of this must be found, perhaps, in the principle that 
all voting, under a compulsory civil government, is alike sin- 
ful. The pro-slavery character of the Constitution — not yet 
discovered — was not alluded to, in the proceedings.* 

* The division gave rise to new contentions. Mr. Garrison and his friends com- 
plained that the '■'■Emancipator''' 1 newspaper (originally established at great expense 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 465 

The historical evidence seems not quite clear that the abo- 
litionists who did not hold themselves bound by those pro- 
ceedings were therefore untrue to the cause of the slave. 

While these divisions produced a strong sensation in New 
England, and in the sea-board cities, the sound of them going 
across the Atlantic, and awakening kindred responses, pro and 
con, from among the abolitionists of Great Britain, the blast 
died away, like a Massachusetts North-Easter, as it traveled 
westward, spending its strength by the time it had reached 
the valley of the Mohawk, and was scarcely felt beyond the 
waters of Lake Erie. 

There were reasons for this. The contention about women's 
acting in the Societies was, at the West, considered a frivo- 
lous one. There were differences of opinion, but the ques- 
tion would not have been pressed, on the one hand, nor have 
been made a ground of withdrawal, on the other. The voice 
of women, in conference and prayer-meetings, in those days 
and previously, in the wide west, had been too familiar to the 
ears of the most fastidious, to admit of their being greatly 
alarmed. 

As to the new policy of not voting, and the theories upon 
which it was based, the march of political anti-slavery was 



and labor by Mr. Tuppan and others, and afterwards transferred by them without 
compensation to the Society) was gratuitously transferred again by the Society to the 
N. Y. City Anti-Slavery Society, a short time before the division, and thus prevented 
from passing into the hands of the newly elected committee. The answer to this 
complaint was, that as the paper did not support itself, as the treasury was empty. 
and individual members of the committee had already assumed heavy liabilities, 
there was no means of paying the printer, and the publication must have been sus- 
pended but for the acceptance of the otfer. To this it might have been added (if it 
was not), that if the paper had passed into the hands of the new committee, it would 
have been used to oppose the sentiments and measures of those who had originally 
established it, who had mainly supported it, and whose subscriptions, after the 
division, could not, to any great extent, have been retained by the publishers. 

Another complaint was, that a member of the old committee had taken possession 
of the Anti-Slavery depository of books, pamphlets, &c, and refused to deliver 
them over to the newly elected committee. The justification was that members of 
the old committee had become individually responsible for the payment of debts 
contracted for the Society, which liabilities the new committee and its members had 
refused to assume ; and the proceeds of the depository would repay only a part of 
the amount due them from the Society. Their final loss was above $8,400. 

30 



466 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

too steadily and too resistlessly on the advance, in the interior 
of the country and at the far west, to be arrested by the rumor 
of what had -been said and clone in the cities of New-York 
and Boston. 

Apart from all this, the abolitionists of the interior, inclu- 
ding those of the far west, were too busily at work in their 
own localities and in their own way, to think it necessary 
lhat they should affiliate with either of the rival National 
Societies, or be under the supervision of either of them. The 
bonds of national organization had, indeed, set lightly upon 
them from the beginning. And with the progress of the cause 
and the consequent increase of local activity and effort, those 
bonds had grown looser and looser. There was a mistake in 
supposing that any one great central Committee could trans- 
act any great proportion of the anti-slavery business to be 
transacted in the country. A central committee in London, 
with a few others in some of the chief cities, might suffice 
for Great Britain. The wider territory of the American States, 
with our more democratic methods of procedure and agitation, 
could not be thus managed. Not only state, but county, vil- 
lage and township organizations were needed. The Com- 
mittee of the New- York State Society, at the central point 
of Utica, could not effectively reach the more western parts 
of the State. A Western Committee had to be organized. 
Not only so, County Societies were encouraged by the two 
State Committees to do up their own work in their own 
way. In other States, the same manifestations were witnessed. 
In short, the previous tendencies to centralization were sub- 
siding. Abolitionists, having felt the evils of too much 
centralized power in the other National Societies, were be- 
ginning to guard against similar evils, among themselves. 
Aside from any unpleasant rupture in the National Society, 
and before it was foreseen, it was becoming evident that the 
functions of such a Society must decrease, instead of expand- 
in«-, with the progress and expansion of the enterprise itself, 
which was, everywhere, cutting its own local channels. 

Thus, while in Boston, New-York, and their vicinities, the 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 467 

great pending question seemed to be, which of the two Na- 
tional Societies should superintend the activities and absorb 
the contributions of American abolitionists, the great majority 
of them, in the interior, found themselves in a convenient 
position to withdraw from the control and from the support 
of either. Within a year from the division in New-York, 
most of the State Anti-Slavery Societies out of New England, 
declined sustaining the position of auxiliaries to either of 
the National Societies, a measure which, it was believed, 
would greatly tend to discountenance divisions. In the States 
of New- York and Ohio, hoAvever, (perhaps in other States,) 
the friends of Mr. Garrison succeeded in forming State Socie- 
ties, sometime afterwards. 

The neutrality we have described may have been wise or 
it may have been unwise. It was assumed at a time when 
the controversy was little understood in the interior, and 
when the changes in progress had been but imperfectly de- 
veloped. 

The fact of so extensive a neutrality respecting the "New" 
and the " Old organizations " belongs to the record, and 
throws light on the true origin of the Liberty Party ; which 
could have had no important or general connection with this 
controversy, as has been represented and supposed, on both 
sides of the Atlantic* It is claimed that the large class of 
abolitionists who wished to escape that contention, have not 
been, as a class, behind others, in their uncompromising fidel- 
ity to the enslaved. 



* We mean to say that the Liberty party, which originated in Western New York, 
did not arise from a wish to oppose the " old organization" or Mr. Garrison — nor 
from a wish to support the " new organization." Some individuals in Massachu- 
setts, who had encountered Mr. Garrison's theory of non-voting, may have been the 
more ready to fall in with an organized party. A letter of E. Wright, Jr., pub- 
lished in the Liberator, shows this. It is equally possible that Mr. Garrison's anti- 
pathy to voting, and his desire to have other abolitionists come into his views of 
voting, might have made him adverse to the organization of such a party, though 
he may not have been distinctly conscious of such a motive himself. We have n«ver 
doubted that if Mr. Garrison had not become a " Non-Resistant," he would have 
been an early and zealous leader of the Liberty party. 



468 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 



CHAPTER XXXIX. 

ORGANIZED POLITICAL ACTION — LIBERTY PARTY — LIBERTY 
LEAGUE — FREE SOIL PARTY. 

Necessity of distinct organization — Early anticipations of this — Garrison, Follen, 
Stewart — Convention at Albany, July, 1839 — Nominations in Monroe Co., N. Y. — 
Myron Ilolley — Rochester "Freeman" — Convention at Arcade — Liberty Party 
organized at Albany, April 1, 1840, and James G. Birney nominated for President 
— Second Nomination, in 1844 — Number of votes — Course of other voting aboli- 
tionists — "What was- accomplished ? — Occasions of instability — Tendencies to re-ab- 
sorption — Different views of its true policy — Nomination of Gerrit Smith by " the 
Liberty League," and why? — Position taken by the "League" — Unconstitution- 
ality of Slavery — Other features — Nomination (by the Liberty Party) of John P. 
Hale — Rise of the Free Soil Party — Nomination of Mr. Van Buren — Buffalo Plat- 
form — Position of Mr. Van Buren — Various views of that movement and of its 
results — Hints for the future — Remnant of the Liberty Party. 

The Liberty party arose from tlie fact, that, after a pro- 
tracted experiment, the candidates of the old parties could 
not, to any extent, if at all, — however " questioned " and 
"pledged " — be depended upon, to do the work which aboli- 
tionists demanded of them. "When they really intended to 
do it, their party associates would not suffer them. It would 
be easy to prove this, if we had room for the details. 

Another fact, lying behind this, must not, as we value the 
impartiality of history, be withheld. Abolitionists themselves, 
connected with the political parties, and who " questioned 
the candidates," could not generally be weaned from an undue 
bias in favor of their political leaders. They too readily 
persuaded themselves that the candidate, of their own party, 
though but slightly or ambiguously pledged, or even if not 
pledged at all, would probably do more for the slave, if elect- 
ed, than the candidate of the opposite party r whatever his 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 469 

anti-slavery reputation or his pledges might be. This delu- 
sion and its effects began, at length, to afford candidates an 
excuse for not answering the questions of abolitionists. They 
said, " It will be of no use, for abolitionists will generally 
vote for the candidates of their respective parties." The 
statement was exaggerated. But on many occasions and in 
many localities, there was enough of truth in it, to render 
the "questioning of the candidates" a farce. 

It Avas hoped that by the organization of a distinct political 
party, this delusion might be dispelled, and abolitionists be 
led to honor their principles at the polls. Though a mi- 
nority, they could exhibit a correct example, and thus pre- 
serve their integrity, and increase their moral power. 

Mr. Garrison had advocated, sometime previous, the form- 
ing of a distinct political party, though he was not now in 
favor of it. His recommendation is, indeed, the earliest that 
we find on record. In his Liberator, in 1834, he advocated 
■ a Christian party in politics " — with particular reference to 
the slave question. 

Prof. Charles Follen, sometime after, suggested the utility 
of a new political party of democratic progress, of which one 
prominent object should be the abolition of slavery. This, 
if we rightly remember, was as early as 1836. 

Alvan Stewart strongly urged upon the Executive Com- 
mittee of the New York State Anti-Slavery Society, in Feb- 
ruary, 1839, the organization of a distinct party. The Com- 
mittee were not then prepared for the measure, but some of 
them saw, clearly, and had long seen, the necessity of strenu- 
ous efforts to counteract the partisan tendencies of abolition- 
ists, by inculcating the highest principles of political morality. 

At the annual meeting of the Society, at Utica, Sept. 19- 
21, 1838, a series of Resolutions, twent}'--two in number, had 
been presented, discussed, and adopted, setting forth the prin- 
ciples of political action, and solemnly pledging those who 
adopted them to vote for no candidates who were not fully 
pledged to anti-slavery measures.* Though not designed, 

* These resolutions, which had been prepared by Win. Goodell, were reported by 



470 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

at that time, to favor distinct anti-slavery nominations, nor 
expected to introduce them, these resolutions recognized a 
moral principle, in voting, which, it was afterwards found, 
could not be acted upon, in the existing state of the country, 
without a new political party. Both parties, then and after- 
wards, were completely under the control of their slavehold- 
ing members. 

A National Anti-Slavery Convention was held at Albany, 
commencing July 31, 1839. It was called by a Committee 
appointed for the purpose at the annual meeting of the Ame- 
rican Anti-Slavery Society, the May previous. Its object, 
as specified in the call, was " to discuss the principles of the 
anti-slavery enterprise " and " the measures suited to its 
accomplishment in the United States, especially those which 
relate to the proper exercise of the right of suffrage by citi- 
zens of the free states." The mode of political action against 
slavery, including the question of a distinct party, was fully 
discussed, but without coming to any definite decision by 
vote, farther than to refer the question of independent nomi- 
nations to the judgment of abolitionists in their different 
localities. 

This suggestion was improved to sanction some local nomi- 
nations in the State of New-York, which, with the discussions 
of the Convention, prepared the way for further progress. 

The Monroe County Convention for Nominations at Roch- 
ester, N. Y., September 28, 1839, adopted a series of Resolu- 
tions and an Address prepared by the late Myron Holly, 
which have been regarded as laying the corner stone of the 
Liberty Party. In his " Rochester Freeman" commenced in 
June previous, Mr. Holley successfully advocated the policy 
of independent political action, and came to be recognized as 
— more than any other one person — the founder of the Liberty 
Party. 

A New-York State Anti-Slavery Convention was held at 



a business committee of which the late Myron Holley was Chairman. They were 
eloquently advocated in the Convention by Gerrit Smith, and extensively circula- 
ted in anti-slavery papers. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 471 

Arcade, (then) Genesee County, January 2Sth and 20th, 
1840, attended by Myron LTolley and Gerrit Smith ; Reuben 
Sleeper, of Livingston County, presiding. This Convention 
issued a Call for a National Convention to be held at Albany, 
April 1, 1840, " to discuss the question of an independent 
nomination of abolition candidates for the two highest offices in 
our National Government, and, if thought expedient, to make 
such nomination, for the friends of freedom to support, at 
the next election." 

The National Convention at Albany was accordingly held, 
at the time appointed, Alvan Stewart presiding. After a 
full discussion, the Liberty party was organized, and James 
G. Birney and Thomas Earle were nominated for President 
and Vice-President of the United States. The traveling, at 
that season of the year, was exceedingly bad, but delegates 
were in attendance from six States. 

The entire vote of the Liberty party at the Presidential 
Election, in the autumn of 1840, amounted to a little less 
than 7000. In 1844, the Liberty candidates, James G. Bir- 
ney and Thomas Morris, received upwards of 60,000 votes. 
These were but a small part of the professed abolitionists of 
the United States. A few hundreds, perhaps, abstained from 
voting, from conscientious scruples, and other considerations. 
But the great majority of those who did not vote for the 
Liberty candidates, unquestionably voted for the nominees 
of the old parties, Harrison, Yan Buren, Polk, and Clay, the 
two latter being slaveholders, and the two former openly 
opposed to the measures and objects of abolitionists. 

Politicians accustomed to identify "success" with the eleo- 
tion of their candidates may ask : "What was effected by the 
organization of the Liberty party? Let the question be an- 
swered by asking another : What would have been the con- 
dition of the anti-slavery cause now, if all the voting aboli- 
tionists of the country had continued to vote (as all except 
"Liberty" men did) for the candidates of the old political 
parties ? If any intelligent and candid politician will say, on 
reflection, that it would have stood on as high a ground as it 



472 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

does now, we have nothing further to say to him on that 
subject. 

A more pertinent inquiry would be : What would, probabty, 
have been the effect, if the sixty thousand Liberty men who 
voted for Birney in 1844, had held firmly tiiat position ? 

But there is a question lying back of this: — Why did they 
not continue to maintain that position ? 

A number of particulars might be adverted to, in reply to 
that question. 

The old party attachments of many who joined the Liberty 
party, were not broken off. They were not steady in their 
adhesion to the Liberty party. Some voted, occasionally, 
with the old parties to accomplish particular objects. Some 
voted for Mr. Clay, as they said, " to keep out Texas." Some 
voted with the old party to procure amendments in State 
Constitutions. Some, if they would confess the truth, to se- 
cure a "protective tariff." Thus, the Liberty party was 
weakened, and confidence in its stability, and even its in- 
tegrity, was undermined. There are thousands of whigs and 
democrats who will affirm that the reason why they never 
joined the Liberty party was because the vacillating course 
of its members led them to anticipate what they say has since 
taken place — its general absorption in a party with a lower 
basis — and, finally, in one or the other of the old parties. 
Why should they quit their party, when those who had done 
so, were evidently on tip-toe for an opportunity to get back 
into it ? 

The ecclesiastical connections of many Liberty party men, 
must have exerted a similar influence upon them ; for their 
religious teachers, to a great extent, exerted a political influ- 
ence in harmony with the old political parties, and directly in 
favor of their candidates. On the eve of Presidential elec- 
tions, their efforts were seldom wanting. When a celebrated 
Doctor of Divinity, on one occasion of the kind, inculcated 
the Christian duty of "voting for the least of two devils" 
that might be in nomination, if one or the other of them must 
succeed — is it credible that Liberty men, confiding in such 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 473 

teachers, would be likely to retain their position ?* It is diffi- 
cult for any class of men to maintain a higher tone of mo- 
rality in their political relations than they do in their Churches, 
thus exalting their politics above their religion. The history 
of the Liberty party has shown this. The little remnant of 
that party exists, because its leading members commonly hold 
a corresponding ecclesiastical position. 

Another cause of instability, connected with causes already 
mentioned, was the idea in many minds that the Liberty party 
was to be available only on one subject, and was pledged to 
neutrality on all other questions, so that whenever any other 
important political duties were to be performed, the Liberty 
party must be temporarily deserted of course. 

Closely allied to this was the idea that the Liberty party 
was only to be a u balance of power 1 ' party, to be re-absorbed 
by either of the parties who should give promise of doing 
most for the cause of freedom. This would naturally en- 
courage an attitude of unreasonable expectancy on the part 
of Liberty men, and give undue importance to any real or 
apparent concessions that might be held out to allure them. 
In short, the policy of " choosing the least of two evils," as 
commended by Dr. Taylor and others, would be embraced, 
and the stern political morality that had originated the Lib- 
erty party would be abandoned. 



* Edmund Tuttle, of Meridan, Conn., in a Letter to Eev. Dr. Taylor, of New 
Haven, propounded this inquiry : 

" Can a Christian, consistently with the word of God, cast his vote, either for a 
duellist, or for an oppressor of the poor, for Chief Magistrate of this nation f 

In an elaborate answer, sustaining the affirmative of the above question, Dr. 
Taylor said : 

" To put a stronger case. Suppose that there is no reasonable doubt that one of 
two devils, one of which is less a devil than the other, will be actually elected, let 
the Christian vote as he may ; and that his vote will therefore be utterly lost if he 
does not vote for one of them ; I think that an enlightened Christian would vote 
for the least devil of the two. " Nathaniel W. Taylor." 

"Yale College, October 5, 1844." 

The date and circumstances of the letter oblige us to infer that the highly com- 
plimentary comparison which it contains was intended for the political benefit of 
Henry Clay, as being, in the writer's view, a lesser devil than James K. Polk. 



474 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN . 

Such at least were the apprehensions of some active Liberty 
men, who began, as early as 1845, to propose safe-guards 
against the re-absorption they so much dreaded and feared. 

They contended that the Liberty party was originally de- 
signed to be a permanent and progressive exponent of human 
rights, and not a mere temporary expedient — that its founda- 
tions were accordingly laid in the first principles of civil 
government — that its platform was as broad as those of re- 
publican institutions and of protecting law — that whatever 
the State and National Governments ought to do, the Liberty 
party ought to seek and propose — that while the abolition of 
chattel slavery was to be the prominent, the paramount mea- 
sure of the party, it was not to be the only one. They quoted 
the writings and speeches of Myron Holly and the early reso- 
lutions and addresses of the Liberty party, to prove that such 
were the views with which the Liberty party was formed. 

The most that could be said in reply to this representation 
was, that the sentiments quoted were expressed, for the most 
part, in general terms. 

To supply, then, this alleged deficiency in a party of pro- 
gress, it was proposed to specify some of the particular mea- 
sures which the principles and professions of Liberty men 
required them to espouse, such as free trade, gratuitous dis- 
tribution of public lands, limitation of land ownership, the 
inalienable homestead, retrenchment of expenses, free suffrage, 
and the abolition of all legalized monopolies and castes. 

In further support of this policy, it was urged that slavery 
was only to be overthrown through the destruction of the 
minor monopolies and aristocracies subsidized by and sus- 
taining it ; and that the forces needed at the ballot box to 
overthrow slavery must consist, to a great extent, of the 
masses of men who feel that they have wrongs of their own 
to be redressed, and who could have no confidence in a Liberty 
party not committed to universal equality and impartial justice 
to all. They predicted that unless this advice was heeded, the 
Liberty party would, ere long, be scattered to the winds. Tbey 
contended that, as civil government is an ordinance of God 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 475 

for the protection of all the rights of all men, we have no right 
to administer it, or to seek to administer it, for any lower or 
partial ends, and that if an Anti-Slavery Society may confine its 
attention to one form of oppression and robbery, it does not 
follow that the functions of civil government may be thus 
circumscribed. 

liberty league. 

A State Convention was held at Port Byron, (N. Y.) June 
25th and 26th, 1845, at which an address was presented, em- 
bracing the preceding views. It was not adopted by the Con- 
vention, but was printed and circulated, and gained adherents. 
By a number of Liberty men embracing its sentiments, a nomi- 
nating Convention was called, which was held at Macedon 
Locke, Wayne Co., N. Y., June 8th, 9th, and 10th, 1847 ; at 
which Gerrit Smith and Elihu Burritt were nominated for 
President and, Vice-President of the United States. Mr. 
Burritt having declined, the name of Charles C. Foote was 
afterwards placed on the ticket, by another Convention, at 
Rochester. The Macedon Convention sent forth an address 
which was widely circulated, and elicited much debate. The 
Convention separated itself from the Liberty party, and took 
the name of the Liberty League. 

These measures were adopted in the confident anticipation 
of the speedy absorption of the Liberty party in some other 
organization holding a receding instead of an advanced posi- 
tion, in respect to slavery itself, to say nothing of kindred re- 
forms. Unequivocal indications of this, were believed to have 
appeared.* 

UNCONSTITUTIONALITY OF SLAVERY. 

It should be mentioned in this place that the doctrine of the 
unconstitutionality of American Slavery had, before this time, 



* Among these was the proposal to defer making a Presidential nomination in 
1S47, leaving it till the next year, to see what course would be taken by prominent men 
in the other parties. It was commonly understood that the nomination of Gerrit 
Smith by the Macedon Convention, induced a majority of the National Committee to 
call the Buffalo Convention. A minority still dissented from that course. Four 
years previous, there had been some similar tendencies. 



476 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

gained a strong foothold in the Liberty Party, and was coming 
to be embraced by many in the old political parties. Eev. 
Samuel J. May, an abolitionist of the Garrison school, had 
written an argument to prove that the Federal Constitution is 
not pro-slavery, which appeared in the Quarterly Anti-Slavery 
Magazine for "October, 1836 and May, 1837. The late Na- 
thaniel P. Rogers, Esq., a lawyer of New Hampshire, an abo- 
litionist of the same school, writing in the same magazine, for 
January, 1837, took the same ground. He even challenged 
the proof that slavery had ever been legalized in Carolina.. 
He affirmed that a rising of the slaves would be no "insurrec- 
tion ;" and intimated that the "guaranty to every State in this 
Union of a republican form of government," was a guaranty 
against slavery. An anonymous writer over the signature of 
"Seventy Six," in the Emancipator of January 4, 1838, threw 
out hints which put many of the friends of liberty on the track 
of further investigation. Alvan Stewart prepared an argu- 
ment, based on the " due process of law," [Amendments, .art, v.] 
which was presented to the annual meeting of the N. Y. State 
A. S. Society in September, 1837, and of the American A. S. 
Society in May, 1838- In 1844 appeared a pamphlet on the 
subject, entitled "Views of American Constitutional Law, in its 
bearing upon American Slavery, 1 ' by William Goodell.* This 
was followed, soon after, by another, " The Unconstitutionality 
of Slavery," by Lysander Spooner, Esq., a gentleman never 
connected with the Liberty Party. The subject now elicited 
general inquir} 7 . Discussions and public debates were held. 
Prominent lawyers, of the old parties, declined the solicitations 
of their political associates, to combat, in public debate, the 
new doctrine, declaring that the printed arguments in its favor 
were impregnable. Others, having entered the lists, admitted, 
afterwards, that they had been baffled. Promiscuous audi- 
ences, not distinctively abolitionists, having heard the question 
debated, voted, by strong majorities, the unconstitutionality of 
slavery. The doctrine was espoused by Liberty Party editors, 



* Upwards of 13,000 copies of this (in two editions) were soon circulated. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 477 

was affirmed by a State Convention of the Massachusetts Li- 
berty Party, by other State Conventions, and at large Liberty 
Conventions all over the State of New York, and at the West. 
The Liberty Party of the country, if remaining in the field, 
and active, was expected to have affirmed the doctrine, ere 
long, in its National Conventions. But most of its leaders 
were apparently marking out for it a course which would re- 
quire that such a doctrine should be abandoned, or held in 
abeyance. It was however made prominent, and strongly in- 
sisted upon by the Liberty League. 

OBJECTIONS AGAINST THE LIBERTY LEAGUE. 

Among objections against the Liberty League, one was, that 
it would divert attention from the Slave Question by the in- 
troduction of other topics. The call of the Macedon Conven- 
tion had stated the views of the signers in nineteen distinct 
propositions, nearly one half of them affirming abstract propo- 
sitions which no republican denies, and some of the rest ex- 
pressing sentiments frequently embodied in the resolutions of 
anti-slavery Conventions. Occasion was nevertheless taken 
from this, to satirize the League, as having put forth a creed 
of nineteen articles, and as having set up nineteen new mea- 
sures as tests* The truth was, the number of its proposed 
measures of government did not exceed those often professed 
before by the old political parties, and by the "Free Soil" 
party since. Yet a party with so wide a platform was, in this 
ease, pronounced impracticable, and abolitionists were warned 
to adhere strictly to their "one idea," as the only antidote 
against apostacy from primitive abolitionism. 

THE " FREE SOIL" TARTY. 

In the midst of these exhortations, the National Convention 
of the Liberty party assembled at Buffalo, October 20th, 1847. 
Gerrit Smith, still a member of the Liberty party, was propo- 



* Some of the measures objected against, have since been claimed by other politi- 
cal parties, including the Free Soil party, and have been rapidly gaining public 
fltvor. 



478 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

sed as a candidate for the Presidency. His nomination would 
have secured the co-operation of the Liberty League, in his 
support. But the course marked out by the leading men in 
that Convention, beforehand, required the nomination of a 
different man from Gerrit Smith. The Liberty party, for the 
first time, adopted the policy of going out of its own ranks for 
a presidential candidate. After debating, awhile, the question 
of nominating at all, till next year, they nominated the Hon. 
John P. Hale, United States' Senator from New Hampshire, an 
" Independent Democrat," who had certainly done himself 
honor in refusing to do homage to the slave power, and who 
had drawn off a portion of the " democracy" of New Hamp- 
shire to his support. But he was not prepared to advocate 
all the measures of Liberty party abolitionists. So far from 
believing in the unconstitutionality of slavery, he did not per- 
ceive (what Daniel Webster* had long before affirmed) the 
constitutional power of Congress to abolish the inter-state slave 
trade. The candidate for the Vice-Presidency was Hon. 
Liecester King, of Ohio. 

But the nomination of Mr. Hale was only a temporary one, 
and answered its temporary purpose, f Gentlemen active in 
making it, united with others, of other parties, in calling 
another Convention, which was held at Buffalo, Aug. 9, 1848, 
composed of the opponents of slavery extension, irrespective of 
parties, and including, of course, as was designed, large num- 
bers who did not intend to be committed to "the one idea" of 
abolishing slavery. On that occasion was organized "the 
Free Soil party," in which the Liberty party was designed to 
be wholly absorbed. Martin Van Buren, of New York, and 
Charles F. Adams, of Massachusetts, neither of them recog- 



* See Quarterly A. S. Mag., April, 1837, p. 232. 

t " The Buffalo Convention had to le summoned, because the Macedon Convention 
had been held, and had done precisely what it did. The Buffalo Convention, when 
assembled, Md to nominate, because a secession had been made from the Liberty 
party, a Liberty League organized, and its presidential nominations made and m* 
nounced."— [ Charter Oal; W. II. Burleigh, editor, a supporter of Mr. Hale and Mr 
Van Bureu.] 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 479 

nized as being distinctively " abolitionists" or Libert}- party 
men, were nominated as candidates for the Presidency and 
Vice-Presidency of the United States. Messrs. Hale and King, 
as was expected, withdrew their names, in consequence or in 
anticipation of this new nomination. 

" THE BUFFALO PLATFORM." 

The following resolutions, with the response of their Presi- 
dential Candidate, define the " platform" of the Free Soil 
party : 

" Resolved, That we, the people here assembled, remembering the exam- 
Die of our fathers in the days of the first Declaration of Independence, 
putting our trust in God for the triumph of our cause, and invoking his 
guidance in our endeavors to advance it, do now plant ourselves upon the 
National Platform of Freedom, in opposition to the Sectional Platform of 
Slavery. 

" Resolved, That slavery in the several States of this Union which recog- 
nize its existence, depends upon State laws alone, which cannot be repealed 
or modified by the Federal Government, and for which laws that Govern- 
ment is not responsible. We therefore propose no interference by Congress 
with slavery within the limits of any State. 

" Resolved, That the proviso of Jefferson to prohibit the existence of 
slavery after 1800 in all the Territories of the United States, Southern and 
Northern ; the votes of six States and sixteen delegates, in the Congress 
of 1784, for the proviso, to three States and seven delegates against it; 
the actual exclusion of slavery from the North-Western Territory, by the 
Ordinance of 1787, unanimously adopted by the States in Congress ; and 
the entire history of that period clearly show that it was the settled policy 
of the nation not to extend, nationalize, or encourage, but to limit, localize, 
and discourage slavery ; and to this policy, which should never have been 
departed from, the Government ought to return. 

" Resolved, That our fathers ordained the Constitution of the United 
States, in order, among other great national objects, to establish justice, 
promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty, but ex- 
pressly denied to the Federal Government, which they created, all consti- 
tutional power to deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without 
due legal process. 

" Resolved, That, in the judgment of this Convention, Congress has no 
more power to make a slave than to make a king ; no more power to insti- 
tute or establish slavery, than to institute or establish a monarchy — no such 
power can be found among those specifically conferred by the Constitution, 
or derived by just implication from them. 



480 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

" Resolved, That it is the duty of the Federal Government to relieve itself 
from all responsibility for the existence or continuance of slavery, wherever 
that Government possesses constitutional authority to legislate on that sub- 
ject, and is thus responsible for its existence. 

" Resolved, That the true, and, in the judgment of this Convention, the 
only safe means of preventing the extension of slavery into territory now- 
free, is to prohibit its existence in all such territory by an act of Congress. 

' ; Resolved, That we accept the issue which the slave power has forced 
upon us, and to their demand for more slave States, and more slave Terri- 
tories, our calm but final answer is, No more slave States, and no more slave 
Territory. Let the soil of our extensive domains be ever kept free, for 
the hardy pioneers of our own land, and the oppressed and banished of 
other lands, seeking homes of comfort and fields of enterprise in the new 
world." 

These were followed by resolutions in favor of cheap post- 
age, retrenchment, abolition of unnecessary offices, elections 
by the people, river and harbor improvements, free grant of 
public lands, payment of public debts, and revenue tariff. 
Here were seven distinct objects enumerated, besides the non- 
extension of slavery. 

It may be asked, how much was intended to be included in 
the sixth of these resolutions. It will not probably be claimed 
that this Convention intended to set up a higher standard than 
that of the Liberty Party Convention that nominated Mr. 
Hale, who was not prepared for the abolition, by Congress, 
of the inter-state slave trade. The following extracts from 
the Letter of Mr. Van Buren, accepting the nomination, will 
show his understanding of the position of the Convention and 
the new party : 

" I have examined and considered the platform adopted by the Buffalo 
Convention, as defining the political creed of the ' Free Democracy,' with 
the attention due to the grave subjects under which it is presented. It 
breathes the right spirit, and presents a political chart which, with the 
explanations I am about to make, I can, in good faith, adopt and sustain. 

" In regard to the chief topics of the resolutions, it is not to be doubted, 
that the present movement of the public mind in the non-slaveholding States, 
upon the subject of slavery, is caused mainly by an earnest desire to uphold 
and enforce the policy in regard to it, established by the founders of the 
Republic. That policy, in addition to the prospective prohibition of the 
foreign slave trade, was — 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 481 

" 1st. Adequate, efficient, and certain security against the extension of 
slavery into territories where it did not practically exist. 

" 2d. That, in the language of your own condensed and excellent resolu- 
tion, ' Slavery, in the several States of the Union which recognize its exist- 
ence, should depend upon State laws, which cannot be repealed or modified 
by the Federal Government ;' and — 

" 3d. A SPIRIT OF CONSIDERATE FORBEARANCE TOWARDS THE INSTITU- 
TION, IN LOCALITIES WHERE IT WAS PLACED UNDER THE CONTROL OF CoN- 
GRESS." ******** 

'• The sixth resolution embraces the subject of slavery in the District of 
Columbia ; and I observe in it a generality of expression, in respect to the 
time when, and the circumstances under which, it was the opinion of the 
Convention that it should be abolished, which has not been usual on the 
part of the friends of immediate action. Most reflecting and philanthropic 
minds live in the hope, that they will one day see slavery abolished, not 
only in that District, but in the States also, in the latter through the agency 
of the State Governments, to whom the Constitution wisely leaves exclu- 
sive power in the matter, and in the former by Congress. I may be mis- 
taken, but I think I see in the guarded language of the resolution, evidence 
of an apprehension, on the part of the Convention, that a difference in 
opinion, to some extent at least, existed among its members, upon the point 
referred to, and of an enlightened and truly patriotic resolve, not to suffer 
that circumstance, if it existed, to weaken the moral power of their una- 
nimity on the great question which had brought them together." 

It is not known that the leading members of the Conven- 
tion that nominated Mr. Van Buren, ever complained that 
he had misunderstood their position. They certainly did not 
withdraw from him their support. 

Here, then, was a platform containing as many collateral 
measures as had been proposed by the Liberty League, but 
omitting " the one idea" of a direct abolition of slavery. Yet 
it was eagerly embraced by many who had scarcely ceaseu 
from protesting against the introduction of other topics by the 
Liberty League, in connection with the highest standard of 
anti-slavery action. 

The position of Mr. Van Buren, and of the party that 
selected him as their chief representative, may be further 
seen from the reference he made to his course during his Pre- 
sidency in respect to the slave question, in his widely circu- 

31 



482 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

lated letter of June 20th, 1848, a few weeks previous to his 
nomination at Buffalo : 

" But deeply penetrated by the conviction that slavery was the only sub- 
ject which could endanger our blessed Union, I was determined that no 
effort on my part, within the pale of the Constitution, should be wanting to 

SUSTAIN ITS COMPROMISES AS THEY WERE THEN UNDERSTOOD, AND IT IS NOW 
A SOURCE OF CONSOLATION TO ME THAT I PURSUED THE COURSE I THEN 
ADOPTED." 

The manner in which Mr. Van Buren sustained the " com- 
promises of the Constitution" when he was President, the 
reader has already seen. 

The enemies of the Liberty party, whigs, democrats, " non- 
resistants," and " Garrison abolitionists," rejoiced greatly at 
its supposed " death and burial." 

REMNANT OF THE LIBERTY PARTY. 

But a little remnant remained. Besides those who had 
organized the Liberty League, there were a few who were 
inclined to favor their views, and there were others who pre- 
ferred to support Grerrit Smith rather than John P. Hale, or 
any candidate that would be likely to be substituted for him. 
lliese, rallied as " the Liberty Party," and in Convention at 
Buffalo, June 15th, 1818, concurred with the Liberty League 
in nominating their candidates. At a subsequent Convention 
at Canastota, Sept. 28th, they adopted the documents denning 
the platform of the Liberty League, which has not, since that 
time, maintained a separate organization. 

RESULTS AND POSITION OF THE "FREE SOIL PARTY." 

After an experiment of three years and a half, from the 
time of its organization at Buffalo, not a few members of the 
Free Soil party found themselves in the position described in 
the following extract, which appeared in the National Era of 
March 4, 1852 : 

" I confess myself disappointed in the results of the Buffalo Convention. 
To one at the time it did seem that the people had become thoroughly 
awake, both to their rights and their duties, and that party attachments are 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 483 

no longer to prevent a manly, fearless assertion of the rights of the free 
North to take the control of the Government, and to wield it in favor of 
liberty. 

" While I believe that that demonstration did exert a salutary influence 
on the then pending election, I am constrained to admit that the high hope? 
then formed have faded away, and left the sad conviction that the people of 
the free States are yet to learn lessons of deep humiliation, before they will 
rise to the true position and dignity of freemen." — Extract of a Letter from 
A. A. Guthrie to the Free Soil Convention of Ohio. 

Others were found who freely expressed their regrets that 
the platform of direct abolition should have been virtually 
exchanged for that of non-extension. 

The editor of the National Era, in commenting upon the 
letter of Mr. Guthrie, thus sums up the result, as he under- 
stands it, of the Free Soil organization : 

"We did not succeed in obtaining a positive act from Congress prohib- 
iting slavery in the Territories, but the power of the movement we re- 
presented was such as to constrain the new administration to countenance 
measures favorable to our views, such as to weaken the confidence of the 
slaveholders in their own doctrines respecting the title to their slaves in free 
territory, such as to impregnate the tide of emigration to California with 
the anti-slavery spirit, thereby inducing the formation of a non-slaveholding 
State on the Pacific, by which our entire Western seaboard was consecrated 
to Freedom. 

" Among the other results attributable to this movement, directly or in- 
directly, are the repeal of the Black Laws of Ohio ; the election of from 
ten to fifteen members of the House for two successive Congresses, acting 
independently of organizations when controlled by slavery ; the election of 
Messrs. Chase and Sumner to the Senate of the United States; the control 
of Wisconsin, Ohio, New York, and Massachusetts, by coalitions, not to be 
coerced into submission to the dictates of the Slave Power ; distraction in 
the old political organizations always subservient to slavery, which thus far 
no efforts have succeeded in allaying ; a more general discussion of ques- 
tions of slavery, in Congress and out, than had ever taken place before ; 
and such a state of the public mind as to have checked, if not extinguished, 
the project of Cuban annexation. Nor must we forget that it was under 
the pressure of this Buffalo Convention that the Oregon Bill, with its clause 
prohibiting slavery, was carried through Congress." 

This, then, it may be presumed, is the most favorable ac- 
count that can be eriven of the results of the Buffalo Conven- 



484 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

tion of August 9, 1848, and of the nomination of Mr. Yan 
Buren. 

On the other hand, there are many who think all the favor- 
able results above-mentioned, and many more now unrealized, 
would have been secured by taking higher instead of lower 
ground on the slave question. Aside from the principle in- 
volved, they maintain that since all congressional contests on 
the subject result uniformly in compromise, it was bad policy 
to set the claims of liberty on the lowest possible ground, that 
of the non-extension of slavery. They judge that a vigorous 
and bold push for the abolition of slavery (at least where it is 
confessedly under jurisdiction of Congress) would have cut 
out other work for the pro-slavery party than opposition to 
the admission of California as a free State ! They have no 
doubt that its prompt admission, together with the adoption 
of the Wilmot proviso, would have been eagerly proposed as 
a "compromise" to stave off the abolition of slavery in the 
Federal District, and the prohibition of the inter-state slave 
trade — to say nothing of the still higher ground of the aboli- 
tion of slavery in the States. Instead of acting merely on 
the defensive, and on their own territory, they would push 
the war into the citadel of the enemy. If "compromises" 
must needs be submitted to, they think a position should be 
chosen that should not inevitably result in placing all the 
concessions on the wrong side. More than all this, they be- 
lieve in the moral obligation of a practical conformity to all ascer- 
tained truth, believing that the God of' truth can control "con- 
sequences " and bring to pass results which no human sagacity 
could calculate or foresee beforehand. Though they were 
glad to see whigs and democrats leave their old parties, to 
take the advanced ground of the Free Soil party, they deeply 
deplored that Liberty party men, especially those who be- 
lieved in the unconstitutionality of slavery, should have 
abandoned the ground indicated by their own convictions, for 
the sake of co-operation with those who held lower views. 

It is questioned by many others, whether the organization 
of the Free Soil party produced all the results attributed to it 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 485 

in the above extract from the National Era. The questions 
that, of necessity, came before Congress, produced great ex- 
citement and drew forth earnest debate. The position of the 
ultra Southern members rendered it inevitable. And many 
members of Congress, not belonging to the Free Soil party, 
were quite as efficient in their advocacy of Northern interests 
as some who did. Among these are to be reckoned such men 
ats William H. Seward, whig Senator from New York, and 
several others, though their party connections naturally tended 
to cripple them. 

It should be noticed that some statesmen in Congress and 
the State Legislatures, who were elected as Free Soil men, or 
by help of the votes of that party, have found their way out 
of the Free Soil party into one or the other of the old parties. 
Among these are some who were formerly in the Liberty 
party, and who exerted themselves most strenuously, first, in 
favor of the ''one idea" policy in opposition to the Liberty 
League ; and, soon afterwards, to merge the Liberty party in 
the Free Soil party. 

In the State of New- York, where the " Buffalo platform" 
was erected, it seems to have fallen down entirely. The Free 
Soil party is extinct in that State, having been absorbed by 
the old Democratic party, and that too, upon a basis which 
unites the "Old Hunkers" and the "Barnburners," — the 
pro-slavery and the anti-slavery sections of the party. It is 
not seen that that party, since the re-absorption, is at all in 
advance of the Whig party, on the slave question. The 
friends of Mr. Seward, in the Whig party, appear to be rather 
in advance of them. 

In Massachusetts and in Ohio, where there are yet some 
signs of life among " Free Soilers," their activity chiefly con- 
sists in temporary and local coalitions with one or the other 
of the old parties, or with portions of them, as circumstances 
may seem to require. It has, in fact, become a question, 
whether, as a national party, the " Free Soil party," as organ- 
ized at Buffalo, in 1848, may be said to exist 

Party ties, even in the old parties, are, to an increasing ex- 



486 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

tent, held loosely. At one time, there were indications of a 
division in both of them, by the organization of anew " Union" 
or Slavery party, to maintain the fugitive slave bill. 

On one point, the Free Soil party, if it exists, is now in 
unity with the remnant of the Liberty party, and the plat- 
form of the late Liberty League. It repudiates the " one 
idea" policy, insisted upon, in 1847-8.* This bone of con- 
tention is now removed. If the members of the Free Soil 
party perceive that the time (if there ever was one) for a ral- 
ly on the low ground of the "Buffalo platform " has now 
passed away — if they feel that the name " Free Soil " — indi- 
cating non-extension, is too narrow to describe their present 
position, as friends of liberty, they would do well to study 
the constitutional question, and the measures of political 
economy that harmonize with the principle of equal rights. 
Such a course, on their part, might result in a re-union of 
all the friends of political action against slavery. 

* See editorial iu National Era, March 4, 1852. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 487 



CHAPTER XT,. 

ANTI-SLAVERY CHURCH AGITATION — NEW ANTI-SLAVERY 
CHURCHES AND MISSIONARY BODIES. 

Consideration, among abolitionists, of their Church relations — Consultations at 
Albany, in July, 1839 — Previous " Anti-Slavery Conference and Prayer Meetings" 

— "Christian Anti-Slavery Conventions," 1340 and onward — Paper devoted to 
the subject — Organization of Independent Anti-Slavery Churches — " Wesleyan 
Church," a secession from the Mcth. E. Church — "Free Presbyterian Church'' 
— "Free Missions" — Several early Missionary organizations — "Union Missionary 
Soc." — " W. India Committee" — " Amistad Committee" — " Western Miss. Asso." 
— Merged (1846) in "Am. Miss. Association" — Church agitation at the West — 
Large Conventions at Cincinnati and Chicago — Papers devoted to these movements 
— Church agitation among Baptists — Correspondence with English Baptists — 
Mission of Cox and Hoby — Organization of a "Baptist Anti-Slavery Convention" 
(as a permanent body), in 1840 — Panic among Southern Baptists— Renewed oppo- 
sition by Northern Baptists — Records of pro-slavery action among them — "Com- 
promise Article" — Expulsion of Elon Galusha and others from the Missionary 
Board, in obedience to Southern demands — Baptist " Free Miss. Soc." organized 
1843, by abolitionists — Old Boards, Slaveholding Missionaries — "Triennial Con- 
vention" dissolved — A new " Baptist Miss. Union" succeeds it — Its character — 
Its anti-slavery professions examined ; also other Baptist organizations — Missions 
of the " Am. Bap. Free Mission Soc." — N. Y. Central College. 

It "would be interesting to trace the history of anti-slavery 
Church agitation, for the last sixteen years. The items lie 
so scattered among different sects, and in various localities, 
that it would be a great task to collect, to classify, and to pre- 
sent them. There are materials sufficient for volumes, but we 
have room for only a few pages. 

It was seen by many, at an early day, that the same prin- 
ciple that required 'political secession, required, in like cases, 
ecclesiastical secession ; and the more especially as the Church 
is naturally expected to be purer than the State, and to con- 
stitute the guide and teacher, by which, on great moral ques- 
tions, the legislation of a country must be moulded. 



488 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

This was seen and felt by many who attended the National 
Anti-Slavery Convention for political discussion at Albany, 
commencing July 31, 1839. A large portion of those in that 
Convention who were church members, and who were then 
looking forward, though vaguely, to some new modes of po- 
litical action, assembled each morning before breakfast, during 
that Convention, for mutual prayer, and for a free considera- 
tion of their ecclesiastical relations.'" The result was a gen- 
eral determination among those present to push the slave 
question in the churches, to "abolitionize" them if possible, 
and if not, secede from them. A resolution was adopted and 
afterwards published, recommending " Christian Anti-slavery 
Conventions" for this end. Even before this date, something 
of the kind had been done on a limited scale in the region of 
central New York, where. "Anti-slavery Conferences and 
prayer meetings" had been frequently held, attended by abo- 
litionists from a few adjoining towns. 

The same connection was perceived by some at the Albany 
Convention just mentioned, who were opposed to political se- 
cession, and who urged, as an objection against an anti-slavery 
party in politics, that it would lead to similar schisms and 
difficulties in the Church. The right course, we were told, 
was to "abolitionize" all the sects and all the parties in reli- 
gion and politics, and then the work would be done. The 
question, nevertheless, recurred, "What shall we do when we 
find it impossible to reform them ? Shall we continue to sus- 
tain them, to be corrupted, perhaps, by them, and to become 
a partaker of their sins ?" 

"Christian Anti-slavery Conventions" were accord- 
ingly notified and held at various points in the State of New 
York, — at Auburn, Penn Yan, Clinton, Syracuse, and a large 
number of other places, — beginning soon after the rise of the 
Liberty party. They were attended by many of those who 



* The prominent exceptions to this statement, should we specify them, would be 
found to be those who are not now (1852) in the ranks of the Liberty party, nor 
active in political efforts against slavery. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 489 

have been active in the Liberty party, — Smith, Birney, Stew- 
art, Green, Chaplin, Torrey, Goodell, and others, — and were, 
some of them, among the largest and most interesting anti- 
slavery conventions ever held in the State.* A little paper, 
conducted by Win. Goodell, devoted mainly to this object, 
was commenced in 18-11, and was published occasionally till 
the beginning of 1813, then monthly till the summer of 1818. 
It was circulated in all the free and some of the slave States, 
and was supported mainly by members of the Liberty party. 

INDEPENDENT CHURCHES. 

As a result of all this, a large number of local independent 
Churches have been gathered by secession from the old 
Churches of several different sects, and holding no ecclesiasti- 
cal connection with them. This movement is chiefly in the 
State of New York and farther west. 

WESLEYAN METHODIST CHURCH. 

From an early period of the present anti-slavery discussion, 
there has been an efficient body of Methodist abolitionists, 
the denomination has been extensively agitated, and the re- 
sult has been a secession from the M. E. Church and the or- 
ganization of a new ecclesiastical connection, known as the 
"Wesley an Methodist Church." 

In the latter part of the year 1831, a number of ministers 
and members of the New England and New Hampshire Con- 
ferences, addressed an appeal to their brethren on behalf of 
the anti-slavery cause. This drew forth a "counter-appeal," 
signed by the late Pres. Fisk and others. Earnest discussions 
and debates followed. The cause of anti-slavery made pro- 
gress, and an anti-slavery delegation from the above confer- 
ences to the General Conference (with exception of one dele- 



* A pamphlet, entitled " The American Churches the Bulwarks of American Sla- 
very" (the first publication of the kind that we know of), was published by James 
G. Birney, the Presidential candidate of the Liberty party, while in England, where 
he attended the " World's Anti-Slavery Convention." Its republication and circu- 
lation in America did much to forward the church agitation of the slave question. 



490 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

gate) was secured. The opposition was however so strong, 
even at the North, and the course of the General Conference 
was such, that a secession was deemed unavoidable. Local 
secessions commenced in Michigan in 1839. Three ministers 
— Jotham Horton, Orange Scott, and La Koy Sunderland,— 
signed an act of withdrawal from the M. E. Church, dated at 
Providence, E. I., Nov. 8, 1842. At a Convention held for 
the purpose, at Utica, K Y., May 31, 1843, the Wesleyan 
Methodist Church was regularly organized. Its polity is not 
Episcopal, but provides for an itinerancy under a modified 
supervision of conferences, recognizing the rights of congre- 
gations, and the participancy of laymen. At the South and 
West, E. Smith has been an effective pioneer in the enter- 
prise. The Wesleyans have made an inroad into North Caro- 
lina, and gained a promising foothold, though some of their 
ministers have been ejected. The connection now (1852) em- 
braces " twelve annual conferences." The " General Confer- 
ence, which is the rule-making body, meets once in four years, 
and is composed of an equal number of ministers and lay- 
men." Churches may elect their own pastors. — Vide " Grounds 
of Secession"— Mattock's History— and MSS. by Luther Lee. 

FREE PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH. 

This church was organized, a few years ago, during the 
sittings of the General Assembly at Cincinnati. It embraces 
Presbyterians of both the Old and New School in Theology, 
who agree in respect to the necessity of separation from slave- 
holders. Among the pioneers of this movement is the Rev. 
John Rankin, of Ripley, Ohio, formerly of Kentucky, who 
wrote and published in favor of immediate emancipation, in 
1824 or '25, before the commencement of Mr. Garrison's la- 
bors. In the connection there are about fifty Churches, and 
three Presbyteries, extending through portions of Pennsylva- 
nia, Ohio, Indiania, and Illinois, the whole composing the 
" Free Synod of Cincinnati." 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. - 491 



FRIENDS. 

A division among the Society of Friends in Indiana, has 
grown out of the slave question, and the manner in which 
active abolitionists in the Society had been treated in their 
yearly and annual meetings. 

Except the Wesleyan secession, there has been but little 
Church secession and re-organization in New England, but 
abolitionists of the Congregational sect in that quarter, extend 
a pretty liberal support to the new "American Missionary 
Association," in preference to the " American Board." 

FREE MISSIONS. 

An Anti-slavery Missionary Committee was organized at 
Boston at an early day, in principal reference, we believe, to 
operations in the British West Indies. The " Amistad Com- 
mittee," having in charge the captives taken in that vessel, 
provided missionaries to accompany them home, and estab- 
lished a mission among them. A " Union Missionary So- 
ciety " was formed by a number of white and colored minis- 
ters and others, in New York and Connecticut. The Western 
Missionary Association, at Oberlin, Ohio, was also of an anti- 
slavery character. All these were afterwards merged in the 
"American Missionary Association," which was formed by a 
Convention of delegates at Albany in the autumn of 1846, on 
a new and broader basis, encouraging the local efforts of 
Churches and auxiliaries to sustain and superintend their 
own missionaries. The Executive Committee, instead of be- 
ing a "close corporation," like the American Board, is chosen 
annually by the contributing constituency ; they exercise limited 
functions, and their proceedings are subject to examination 
and revision at the annual meetings of their constituents, the 
members of the association. The association has missions in 
Africa, in Siarn, in the West Indies, among the Ojibue In- 
dians, at the Sandwich Islands, and in Canada. It also occu- 
pies, to a considerable extent, the field of Home Missions, 



492 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

which are included in its plan. It has a missionary in Ken- 
tucky, where two ' new Churches have been organized that 
exclude slaveholders. An important auxiliary to this asso- 
ciation has recently been organized in Ohio, carrying on its 
own operations in that region, in a manner provided for in 
the Constitution of the American Missionary Association. 

CHURCH AGITATION AT THE WEST. 

The subject of Anti-slavery Church Eeform has recently 
received a fresh impulse in the Western States. In April, 
1850, a large and influential Christian Anti-slavery Conven- 
tion was held at Cincinnati, Ohio, invited by a committee re- 
presenting several religious denominations. Members were 
in attendance from most of the Middle and Western States.' 
A similar convention was held at Chicago, 111., in July, 1852. 
At these conventions, after long and earnest discussions, reso- 
lutions were adopted in favor of withdrawing from churches, 
ecclesiastical bodies, and missionary organizations, connected 
with slaveholding. Among the active members of one or 
both of these conventions were Eev. B. P. Aydellotte, D. D., 
late President of Woodward College, Rev. C. G. Finney, 
President of Oberlin College, Rev. Asa Mahan, President of 
Cleveland University, Rev. Jona. Blanchard, President of 
Knox College, Illinois, Rev. John Rankin, Rev. Dr. Wilson, 
of Pittsburg, Rev. E. Smith, Rev. J. B. Walker, Rev. E. H. 
Kevin, Rev. Samuel Lewis, Rev. Dr. Brisbane, Rev. C. B. 
Boynton, Rev. E. Goodman, Rev. John G. Fee of Kentucky, 
&c. &c, and some from the more easterly States. 

"The "Christian Era," Chicago— the "Christian Press," 
Cincinnati — and the "Free Presbyterian," are journals de- 
voted to Free Missions and Anti-slavery Church Reformation. 
The " Free Wesleyan," New York, is the organ of the Wes- 
leyan connection. Baptist abolitionists have had their " Chris- 
tian Reflector," " Christian Contributor." "American Baptist," 
&c. &c. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 493 

BAPTISTS. 

The history of anti-slavery agitation among Baptists con- 
nects itself so closely with the history of pro-slavery move- 
ments in the same sect, that we must present them together. 

The position of the Baptist denomination, Northern and 
Southern, concerning slavery, was shown in a former chapter,* 
so far as it could be done without distinctly anticipating the 
account of the struggle between abolitionists and their op- 
posers in that sect. Some further particulars are in place 
here, connected with the anti-slavery Church agitation among 
them. 

The leading influences in this sect, as in the other?, were 
brought to bear, at an early day, against all agitation of the 
subject. The violent denunciations against abolitionists, by a 
Baptist Association in Virginia, in 1885, has been noticed 
already. f A spirit of servility, as in the other sects and in 
the political parties, was already manifest among Baptists at 
the North. The Baptist Magazine, as early as 1834, like the 
leading periodicals of the other principal sects, was closed 
against the discussion. 

The "Board of Baptist Ministers, in and near London," 
Dec. 31, 1833, addressed a fraternal letter, signed by Eld. W. 
H. Murch, their Chairman, to "the Pastors and Ministers of 
the Baptist denomination throughout the United States of 
America." In this letter they gave an account of their own 
struggle in England against slavery in the British West In- 
dies, and made some very modest suggestions respecting 
slavery in the United States. It was directed to "Kev. Spen- 
cer H. Cone, President, the Board of Managers, and the Dele- 
gates of the Baptist Triennial Convention," supposing this tp 
be the most ready method of access to Baptist churches in 
America. Eld. Howard Malcom, afterwards a slaveholder 
in Kentucky, though then a Northern man, was clerk of the 
convention. The letter was kept at Boston several months, 



Chapter XV. t Chapter XXXV. 



494 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

then sent to Elders Cone and Somers, New York, and by 
them returned to the Board at Boston. 

By Sept. 1, 1834, an answer was prepared by a Committee 
of the Board, accompanied with a series of resolutions. The 
tone of these was apologetic of slaveholding, yet disclaiming, 
responsibility for its existence, declining to interfere with the 
subject, and adducing the "consideration" that "there is now 
a pleasing degree of union among the multiplying thousands 
of Baptists throughout the land." To this was added a warm 
eulogium of "our Southern brethren" who "are generally, 
both ministers and people, slaveholders," yet "liberal and 
enterprising in the promotion of every holy enterprise for 
the extension of the gospel." This reply, as well as the let- 
ter from England, were kept secret. And it was not until 
the publication of both documents in England, and their re- 
publication by the editor of the (Presbyterian) New York 
Observer, (who was gratified with the American answer) that 
the editor of the Baptist " Christian Watchman " in Boston, 
after request by Eld. Grosvenor, gave them to his Baptist 
readers, thirteen months after the date of the English letter. 

Another answer, and of an opposite tone, " with more than 
one hundred and eighty signatures," was however sent to the 
" Baptist Board in and near London," by a Baptist Conven- 
tion held in Boston, May 26 and 27, 1835. — Facts for Baptist 
Churches, p. 15-29. 

" Soon after (this) correspondence, Elds. Cox and Hoby, delegates from 
the Baptist Union, (England) visited this country. The influence of the 
Triennial Convention was employed to keep them as silent as possible in 
regard to the enormous sin of American slavery." — lb. p. 29. 

The delegates were sent to America, charged by the Eng- 
lish Baptist Union with the following mission : 

" We send our deputation to promote most zealously, and to the utmost 
of their ability, in the spirit of love, of discretion and fidelity, but still 
most zealously to promote the sacred cause of negro emancipation. ,! 

The delegation attended the Triennial Convention at Eich- 
mond, Virginia, but said not a word in public concerning 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 495 

slavery. One of them, Elder Cox, declined an invitation to 
take part in the proceedings of the American Anti-Slavery 
Society in New York. lie also declined a similar invitation 
at Boston. But soon afterwards, at the Free-Will Baptist 
Yearly Meeting in New Hampshire, he adventured to speak 
against slavery. — 76., pp. 296-302. 

This was in 1835. On the return of the delegation to Eng- 
land, and their report to the English Baptist Union, in June, 
1836, resolutions against slavery were adopted, ^and it was 
voted that the committee take an early opportunity to address 
a letter to the American Baptist Triennial Convention on the 
subject. This was accordingly done, under date of London, 
Sept. 13, 1836. 

From this letter it appears that the English delegation, 
while in this country, " although they did not mention the 
subject of slavery in the iniblic proceedings of the Conven- 
tion ; yet, at a private meeting assembled for the purpose," 
they made known the import of their errand. The letter 
argued against slavery at some length. 

It was answered, Jan. 7, 1837, not by the Board, to whom 
it was addressed, but by one of the members, Elder Baron 
Stowe, of Boston, informing that " the Board, under existing 
circumstances, will not, in anyway, intermeddle with the sub- 
ject of slavery." 

A number of English Baptist Associations adopted resolu- 
tions on the subject of American slavery, and expressive of 
their deep mortification and regret at the position of Baptists 
in America. 

The English Baptist Union, May, 1837, adopted a resolu- 
tion of sympathy with American abolitionists, and addressed 
a letter " to the Ministers and members of Baptist churches 
in the United States," entreating them to " listen to the cries 
of the oppressed, at whatever cost." Fraternal correspond- 
ence, between American Baptist abolitionists and Baptist 
bodies in England, was continued, afterwards. — lb., pp. 30-44. 

Thus encouraged, Baptist abolitionists in America, a few 
weeks after the organization of the Liberty party, and simul- 



496 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

taneously with similar movements, in some form, among abo- 
litionists of other sects, assembled in a general or National 
Convention. It was held in Macdougal- Street Baptist Church, 
New York, April 28, 1840, " for the purpose of considering 
the connection of the denomination with slavery, and inquir- 
ing, ' What could be done ?' " 

An organized "National Baptist Anti-Slavery Convention" 
was the result. An address was issued to the Baptist churches 
of the North, and another to "Baptist slaveholders in the 
Southern States." 

This was the signal for renewed opposition. The slave- 
holders threatened. And influential ministers at the North 
sent forth their "Counsels and Cautions."— " Facts," &c, pp. 
44-45. 

" In 1841, the Triennial Convention was to hold its appointed meeting in 
Baltimore. All parties, North and South, looked forward with deep interest 
to this session." — lb., p. 49. 

The Savannah Eiver Baptist Association 

1. " Resolved, That we deem the conduct of northern abolitionists highly 
censurable and meddlesome, and request our State Convention to instruct 
their delegates to the Triennial Convention to demand of out northern bre- 
thren WHETHER THEY CAN ACKNOWLEDGE THOSE FANATICS AS THEIR CO- 
WORKERS IN THE GREAT WORK OF EVANGELIZING THE WORLD, and to State 

fully to them the impossibility of our further co-operation, unless they 

DISMISS SUCH FROM THEIR BODY." 

2. " Resolved, That the State Convention be requested to retain the funds 
sent by this Association until the Triennial Convention shall publish their 
repudiation of the whole spirit and conduct of Baptist abolitionists." — fl>., 
p. 49. 

The Camden (S. C.) Baptist Church unanimously 

'• Resolved, That we recommend to our Association to use their influence 
to have Elon Galusha expelled from his office of Vice-President of the 
Board of Foreign Missions ; that they have a right to require it, and should 
make his expulsion the condition of their future connection with the 

Board." 

" Resolved, That we extend to Northern Baptists opposed to the aboli- 
tionists our warmest affection and fraternal regard. They will ever have 
an interest in our prayers." — lb., p. 50. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 497 

The editor of the (Uaptist) Religious Herald, Richmond, Va., after de- 
scribing the Baptist Anti-Slavery Convention and its doings, in connect ion 
with the foregoing action of the Camden Church, says : " In North Caro- 
lina, South Carolina, Georgia and Alabama, Conventions, Associations and 
Churches, have noticed this Address to Southern Baptists." — lb. 

About this time a correspondent of the (Baptist) Recorder & 
Watchman (N. C.) stated that the President and seven of the 
fifteen Vice-Presidents of the Board of Foreign Missions live 
in slaveholding States and District of Columbia, &c, adding, 
" It is also well known that the Acting Board in Boston are 
decidedly in opposition to abolition measures." — lb., p. 51. 

" The Circular of the Boston Board" (Daniel Sharp, Presi- 
dent, Baron Stowe, Secretary,) as published in the Christian 
Reflector, Dec. 2, 1840, manifests great solicitude to exclude 
t; irrelevant subjects." It describes the one exclusive object of 
the Association, the promotion of Foreign Missions, and de- 
precates the withdrawal of support by contributors. The 
Board must not be held " accountable for things done and not 
done, in relation to cdl which, alike, the Board has done nothing 
because it had nothing to do." 

This was an elaborate effort to retain the support of both 
abolitionists and slaveholders, and it satisfied neither party. 
The Georgia Baptist State Convention expressed their dis- 
satisfaction ; the Board replied, and sent out their Treasurer, 
Mr. Heman Lincoln, to explain, verbally. But all in vain. 
The Chairman of the Georgia Executive Committee said : 

'• If the object of the Board in sending their delegate to us, is to try to 
steer between us and the abolitionists, they might have spared themselves 

THE EXPENSE AND TROUBLE." lb., p. 57. 

The American and Foreign Bible Society, Feb. 3, 1841, sent 
out an address to its members and supporters of a similar 
character, signed by S. H. Cone, President, C. G. Somers, Cor. 
Secretary. 

A kindred " Circular of the Executive Committee of the 
American Baptist Home Missionary Society" S. II. Cone, Chair- 
man, Benj. M. Hill, Cor. Sec, was issued a few days after, 
Feb. 16th. This was addressed " to the Churches." It has less 

32 



498 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

the appearance of neutrality than the preceding documents. 
It alludes to " the action of Anti-Slavery Societies formed at 
the North." " Our brethren at the South, with great una- 
nimity," saj-s the Circular, " deprecate the discussion as unwar- 
ranted, the measures pursued as fatal to their safety, and 
complain of the language occasionally employed as cruel and 
slanderous." But the Society could not act on the subject. 
" We need union" say they, "as a denomination: And as 
patriots, we must cherish religious union, as one among the strong- 
est, although not the most prominent, of the hands that hold toge- 
ther the Union of these States." Thus "the churches" were 
exhorted to shape their religious union, for the promotion of 
political ends, though, in the same Circular, the same churches 
were warned not to " furnish an armory for the secular con- 
flicts of the times," but to say with Nehemiah, "I am doing 
a great work, and I cannot come down!" — lb., pp. G7-71. 

Such were the teachers under which northern Baptists were 
trained for the Triennial Convention, which assembled at Bal- 
timore, in April, 1841. In a secret caucus, a so-called "Com- 
promise Article," drawn up by Eld. S. H. Cone, was adopted 
and signed by 74 persons, including prominent northern men. 
Like all other " compromises" on the slave question, it gave 
all to slavery. It discouraged "innovation" and "new tests." 
This would be understood as a censure of abolitionists who 
contemplated a separation from slavery, or who refused to 
commune with slaveholders. If any should think of its possi- 
ble application to the southern " demand" of excluding aboli- 
tionists from office in the Missionary Board, the illusion would 
soon be dissipated by the action of the Convention. 

In the election of officers, those " demands" were substan- 
tially complied with, to - the full satisfaction of the South, as 
was afterwards expressed. All known abolitionists were left 
off the Board of Foreign Missions. Eld. Baron Stowe was not an 
exception. He had been obnoxious to the South, but in a 
letter to the Foreign Secretary, read at the meeting of the 
Southern Delegates, he expressed his unwillingness " to deny 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 499 

any courtesy to a Christian brother because he is a slave- 
holder." 

Elder Elon Galusha, whose expulsion was demanded by 
name, was accordingly ostracized. Eld. Bichard Fuller, of 
S. Carolina, a slaveholder, and a Biblical defender of slavery, 
was elected in his room. — lb. p. 82-8. 

The delegation from the South held a meeting before leav- 
ing Baltimore, and addressed a letter to their constituents, in 
which they say — "The election of the Board of Managers re- 
sulted agreeably to our wishes." Signed by F. Stocks, Chair- 
mon, J. B. Jeter, Sec. pro. tern. — lb. p. 85-6. 

But the Baptist abolitionists were not discouraged. The 
anniversary of the American Baptist Anti-Slavery Convention 
was, soon after, held in New York City, and another Conven- 
tion was held in Boston. 

The extreme solicitude of the northern Conservatists to pre- 
serve " union" only precipitated the inevitable rupture. And 
the "Compromise article" of 18-11, like the later "Compro- 
mise measures" in Congress, instead of settling " the vexed" 
question, only opened the controversy afresh. The excind- 
ing of the abolitionists, like the Fugitive Slave bill, only served 
to show the North its degraded position. The continued em- 
ployment of slaveholding missionaries was too glaring an out- 
rage to be tolerated in the free States. The proposed change 
in that policy would be equivalent to open Avar on their 
"brethren of the South." The two Missionary Boards, (the 
Home and the Foreign) were placed in no enviable position. 
The slaveholders on the one side, and the abolitionists on the 
other, like the upper and nether mill-stone, were likely to 
grind them to powder. 

The Baptist Anti-Slavery Convention and its labors resulted 
in the permanent organization of " The American Baptist Free 
Missionary Society," in Boston, May 4, 1843. It was a timely 
and decisive step, forming an era in the history of American 
Baptist Missions. — lb. p. 384. 

The old Boards met again, at Philadelphia, in April, 1844. 
" The chief theatre of discussion was the Home Mission So- 



500 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

ciety ; yet as the same individuals constituted both societies, 
the influence told with equal power on the Triennial Conven- 
tion." The point in debate was the employment of slavehold- 
ing missionaries. In neither society was any definite action 
reached, further than the adoption of resolutions evading the 
question, disclaiming any action for or against slavery, and 
leaving each member free to be a slaveholder or an abolition- 
ist, as he pleased. In the Home Society, this passed by a vote 
121 to 61. In the Foreign (from which abolitionists were, per- 
haps, either displaced or had withdrawn,) it was said to have 
been adopted unanimously. But neither abolitionists nor 
slaveholders could be conciliated or satisfied, for both were in 
earnest, and wished for some decision of the matter. A mo- 
tion, in the Home Society, for a Committee to report on 
" an amicable division," was also adopted unanimously !— lb. 
p. 87-91. 

Similar action was had by the Foreign Board, at a meeting 
at Providence, in 1815. 

The division was, in fact, rendered inevitable, by the posi- 
tion in which the Acting Board, at Boston, found themselves 
placed. Determined to maintain a neutral position, they were 
reluctantly driven from it, by the action of the Alabama Bap- 
tist State Convention. By this body a letter was addressed to 
the Board, Nov. 25, 1814, transmitting resolutions, in which 
they " demand the distinct and explicit avowal that slavehold- 
ers are eligible and entitled to all the privileges and immuni- 
ties of their several unions, and especially to receive any 
agency , mission, or other appointment which may fall within 
the scope of their operations and duties." This was a test 
which could no longer be evaded. Abolitionists as well as 
slaveholders were watching them. In their reply, dated Bos- 
ton, Dec. 17, 1811, the Acting Board said— 

" Allow us to express our profound regret that they" (the Resolutions) 
" were addressed to us. They were not necessary. We have never, as a 
Board, done, or omitted to do, anything which requires the explanations and 
avowals that your resolutions 'demanded.' They also place us in the new 
and trying position of being compelled to answer hypothetical questions," 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 501 

&c. They further said that they had " never called in question your (the 
slaveholder's) social equality, as to all the privileges and benefits of the Fo- 
reign Missionary Union." "Nor," say the Board, " have we ever em- 
ployed our official influence in impeaching you." 

After much ingenious circumlocution, they, however, pro- 
ceeded to say : 

" If, however, any one should offer himself as a missionary, having 
slaves, and should insist on retaining them as his property, we could not 
appoint him." * * * " We disfellowship no one." * * * "If our 
brethren in Alabama, with this exposition of our principles and feeiiugs, can 
co-operate with us, we shall be happy to receive their aid. If they cannot, 
painful to us as will be their withdrawal, yet we shall submit to it, as being 
neither caused nor sought by us." 

Of the consistency of this we say nothing. The reader 
will judge of it, and whether a principle of disfellowship 
with slavery, or only a reluctant compliance with a northern 
sentiment avowed by abolitionists, occasioned the refusal to 
appoint slaveboldiug missionaries. 

The decision produced of course a great sensation at the 
South. Conventions and Associations recommended a gene- 
ral Southern Convention to form a new Missionary Board. 
The Tennessee Baptist Foreign Missionary Society, however, 
at a meeting in Nashville, April 2, 1845, expressed their 
regret that the Acting Board at Boston should have been sus- 
pected and interrogated ; yet they said, the Acting Board, by 
its answer, had " rendered themselves justly obnoxious to the cen- 
sures of the whole church" and they " Resolved, that, in our opin- 
ion, the Convention will not sustain the position of the present 
Acting Board in regard to slavery." 

These proceedings were transmitted " to the Board of the 
Triennial Convention soon to convene in annual session at 
Providence, R. I.," and the closing prediction was then veri- 
fied. The neutral position there assumed (as already seen) 
was a virtual reproof of the Acting Board. Eesolutions ap- 
proving their course were offered by Eld. B. T. Welch, but 
being warmly resisted, were withdrawn. — lb., pp. 104-13, also 
145-6, &c. 



502 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

But nothing could now save either the " Acting Board/' of 
Foreign Missions, or the " Triennial Convention." Their dis- 
solution was manifestly inevitable. 

" The Home Mission Board was subjected to a similar test. The Georgia 
Baptist Convention sent to this Board the name of Mr. James E. Reeve, 
stating that he was a slaveholder, and requesting the Board to appoint 
him as a missionary." 

It was also stated explicitly that this application was made 
to test the position of the Board. The Board declined making 
the appointment, not because the candidate was a slaveholder, 
as they were careful to explain, but because the Board, having 
taken neutral ground, would not permit that neutrality to be 
disturbed by the mode of requesting appointments. In this 
respect they placed abolitionists and slaveholders upon pre- 
cisely an equal footing. They said : 

" When an application is made for the appointment of a slaveholder or 
an abolitionist, or an anti-slavery man, as such, or for appropriations to fields 
where the design of the applicant is apparently to test the action of the 
Board in respect to the subjects of slavery or anti-slavery, their official 
obligation either to act on the appointment, or to entertain the application, 
ceases. Therefore, 

" Resolved, That in view of the preceding considerations, it is not expe- 
dient to introduce the subjects of slavery or anti-slavery into our delibera- 
tions, nor to entertain applications in which they are introduced. 

" Resolved, That, taking into consideration all the circumstances of the 
case, we deem ourselves not at liberty to entertain the application for the 
apppointment of Rev. James E. Reeve." — lb., pp. 124-26. 

The action at Providence was adapted to soothe and appease 
the slaveholders, but they had already committed themselves 
extensively to a Southern Convention. " The South antici- 
pated the co-operation of the North in entering into their 
organization." The North, too, (equally opposed, as the lead- 
ing men were, to abolition,) would also be compelled to re-or- 
ganize. On both sides it was an amicable as well as a reluctant 
separation. 

The Southern Baptist Convention assembled at Au- 
gusta, (Geo.,) May 8, 1845, and formed a new missionary 
organization, of the same name. A sympathizing letter from 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 503 

President Wayland was read, in which he said : " Your rights 
have been infringed." "We" (of the North) "have shown 
how Christians ought not to act. It remains for you to show 
us how they ought to act." Mr. Burroughs, of Pennsylvania, 
was present, and said : "The Middle States were opposed to 
the action of the Boston Board, and were at a loss what 
course to pursue." The address put forth by the Convention, 
said : 

" Let not the extent of this disunion be exaggerated. At the present time 
it involves the Foreign and Domestic Missions of the denomination. North- 
ern and Southern Baptists are still brethren." 1 

A correspondence with the Boston Board was immediately 
opened for negotiating a convenient " transfer of a portion of 
the missions under their charge to the patronage of the South- 
ern Baptist Convention." The project was fraternally enter- 
tained, and the object was ultimately effected. Columbian 
College, also, was given to the South. — lb., pp. 163-169, &c.. 
also 214. 

"The American Baptist Missionary Union" is the 
name of the new organization at the North, which takes the 
place of the old. The time and circumstances of its forma- 
tion are as follow : 

A special meeting of the Baptist General Convention was 
held in New York City, Nov. 19, 1815. Eld. Francis Wayland, 
President, Eld. E. H. Neale, Assistant Secretary. Eld. Spencer 
H. Cone presented and explained the Constitution of "The 
American Baptist Missionary Union," which, after discussion, 
was adopted; and a committee appointed "to inform the 
Trustees of Columbian College that the Triennial Convention 
is now dissolved, in order that they may take such measures as 
in consequence may be necessary." 

" The Baptist General Convention" was a delegated body, 
responsible to those who appointed them ; and were neither 
authorized to "dissolve," nor to form a new organization. 
But they did both, and in doing it they constituted themselves 
life members of the new " Union," free of cost, providing that 



504 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

" other persons'' might become life members by paying one 
hundred dollars. " This Union shall be comjjosed of life mem- 
bers." The representative principle was thus set aside. The 
" Union" of "life members" is neither responsible to the con- 
tributors, nor to the churches. 

Eld. Cone, in explaining the Constitution, said : 

"They did not want a Missionary Convention to be divided either by 
Mason and Dixon's line, or any other line ; and under the proposed Con- 
stitution, no extraneous question of slavery or anti-slavery, or temper- 
ance, or anything else, apart from the one great question for which they 
were organized. Any member may pursue his private predilections as he 

lists, BUT HE CANNOT BRING THEM FORWARD IN THE ' AMERICAN BAPTIST 

Union for Foreign Missions,' " 

It was objected that the terms of Union would admit 
either Universalists or slaveholders, but the article was not 
changed. 

Eld. M. D. Miller, of Vermont, moved to add to the " Qual- 
ifications of Officers," the words, "and not slaveholders" — 
thus excluding such from office. The amendment was lost. 

" Eld. J. W. Sawyer, of Maine, presented a communication on the sub- 
ject of slavery, from the American Baptist Free Mission Society, which 
was unanimously laid on the table." 

Eld. B. T. Welch offered a resolution in commendation of 
the " Acting Board" at Boston. It was opposed by Elders 
J. M. Peck, Turnbull, Cone, Stowe and Neale, and finally 
withdrawn. [The "Acting Board" had refused to employ 
slaveholding missionaries.] 

A communication presented by Eld. Sawyer proposed the 

following: 

" Resolved, That in the secession of Southern Baptists from the Baptist 
Triennial Convention, we recognize a division between free and slavehold- 
ing missions, which we wish, on the grounds of Christian principle, to 
remain perpetual, as to the American Baptist Missionary Union." 

The Resolution was not adopted. 

" Many have blamed the Free Mission Society, because it 
did not disband at the formation of this Union." But why 
should it disband? Should it do so, a re-union of the North 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 505 

with the South, in support of slaveholding missionaries, would 
not, probably, be long delayed. 

" Ever desirous of union with tlieir brethren of the North, the Free Mis- 
sionists sent an address to the ' Union,' at its second Annual Meeting at 
Troy, May, 1818. It was with difficulty that an opportunity was gained, of 
presenting it to the Body, When it had been presented and read, immedi- 
ately a motion was made to lay it on the table. The motion prevailed, one 
or two voting in the negative." — lb. p. 171-180. 

"The Union,*' by a vote, eonstituted the members of the 
Triennial Convention life members of the Union : and this in- 
cludes some slaveholders. — lb. p. 201. 

"At the first anniversary of 'the Union' at Cincinnati, five 
members are set down from Kentucky. The Banner and Pio- 
neer (a Southern Baptist paper,) calls them ' our representa- 
tives.'" -A p. 207. 

Eld. J. G. Binncy, formerly pastor of the Savannah Church, 
Georgia, and highly eulogized in the address of the Southern 
Convention, is sustained by the A. B. M. Union as Superin- 
tendent of the institution for training native Missionaries. — 
lb. p. 168. 

" Finally, the ' Union' has maintained slaveholding in its 
Indian Missions, up to the present time (1850)." — lb. p. 210. 

The fact that the Baptist Cherokee and Choctaw Churches 
were slaveholding, was alluded to, in the proceedings of '' the 
American Board," at Worcester, in 1844, and again at Brook- 
lyn, in 1845. Thus countenanced by Baptist example, they 
felt sustained in their own position. — lb. p. 249-253. 

These churches came under care of the " Union." 

At the anniversary of the A. B. M. Union in Philadelphia, May, 1840, 
"Eld. Colver rose and declared in the presence of the whole Board, that the 
Cherokee churches were sanctioning slaveholding." — lb. p. 252. 

After much effort, a Keport of the Committee was obtained, 
touching lightly on the subject, speaking of it as a rumor, and 
saying that they were " taking measures to ascertain the facts 
of the case." But the facts appear to have been sufficiently 
ascertained !— lb. p. 253-2G8. 



506 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

The Baptist Home Mission Society survived the Tri- 
ennial Convention and the Foreign Board, notwithstanding 
the secession of slaveholders. But its character, like that of 
the newly organized " Union," seems to run in the old chan- 
nel. Like the " Union," it is controlled, mainly, if not wholly, 
by the northern leaders of the Baptist sect, who are in close 
fellowship with slaveholders, but have no sympathy with 
abolitionists — except with those who co-operate with them, in 
preference to the " Free Mission Society." 

" In New York, 1846, a new Constitution was presented 
and adopted. The chief change was the casting off of the 
auxiliaries," the northern as well as the southern. In a cir- 
cular to the Baptist churches and associations, composing the 
Baptist Missionary Convention of the State of New York, 
written by Eld. Wheelock, agent of the society, the reason as- 
signed for this change was, that attempts had been made " in 
some quarters to control the parent society, about matters of 
local policy, concerning which there were different opinions. 
That which brought the evil to a crisis was the Slave Contro- 
versy." By cutting off auxiliaries and delegations, the Board 
became independent of the people, and their voice was hushed. 
In other respects, the new Constitution took no new ground 
on the slave question. — lb. p. 307-318, 19. 

" Elder N. Colver gave notice, that at the next annual meeting he should 
move, so to alter the Constitution as to instruct the Missionaries of the So- 
ciety not to administer baptism to adhering slaveholders, nor the ordinances 
to a slaveholding church." 

In 1817 the matter was called up, and laid over again, till 
1818, when, it was indefinitely postponed. 

And yet, it is asserted that "the society has cut loose from 
slavery {"—lb. 308. 

The Society and its Reports maintain studied silence on the 
subject of slavery. It has a large number of slaveholding life 
members or life directors, whose names are given in the " Facts 
for Baptist Churches." " The number of members in the 
Slave States is two hundred and eighty-five." — lb. p. 316-18. 

Mr. J. Finch, a slaveholder, was a missionary of the Society, 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 507 

in 1846, and the term of his appointment did not expire till 
1st Feb., 1847. From the Report of 1848, it is evident that 
the Society was in the receipt of slaveholders' funds. — lb. p. 
311-13. 

The American and Foreign Bible Society also continues 
its former position. It receives slaveholders to membership, 
and savs nothing against the laws or the usages which with- 
hold bibles from slaves. 

The " Baptist Banner and Pioneer," of Kentucky, one of the most bit- 
ter and vindictive of all the southern religious papers, in 1816, said — 

" The Am. and Foreign Bible Society may now be regarded as the only 
ligament that binds the North and the South in union, and we trust that this 
bond will not be infracted." 

It was not the " only" ligament, but it was a prominent one. 
In 1848 the annual report showed the receipt of $6,753 53 
from the slave states. — lb. p. 333, 4. 

In 1849, while the choice of officers was pending, a motion 
that the Nominating Committee should report no names of 
slaveholders, was negatived, and slaveholders were accord- 
ingly elected. — lb. p. 337, 8. 

The American Baptist Free Mission Society, organized 
in 1843, admits no slaveholding members, nor any who do 
not possess "an acknowledged Christian character." It is 
" amenable to the Churches, and earnestly invites them to 
control its affairs by its annual delegations." It recognizes no 
distinction founded on color. Its plan embraces both Foreign 
and Domestic Missions — also Bible and Tract operations. It 
has a Mission in Haiti, another in Canada, others at the West, 
and contemplates missions in several portions of the South. — 
President of the Society, Harvey Hawes, Maine; Correspond- 
ing Secretary, Eld. C. P. Grosvenor, McGrawsville, Cortland 
Co., K Y. ; Treasurer, George Curtiss, Utica, N. Y. 

The New-York Central College, at McGrawsville, (N. 
Y.) incorporated in 1848, is an institution " pledged to the 
morality of anti-slavery," knows no distinction of color,* and 



* In another connection, similar mention might have been made of tho College 



508 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

welcomes accomplished colored Professors, as well as students. 
It originated with the founders of the Free Mission Society, 
as a part of their movement. 

Whether Baptist abolitionists will be able to maintain these 
free movements without separating from pro-slavery influences 
in local churches and in associations, remains to be seen. But 
they deserve much credit for their efficient labors, hitherto, in 
the cause of Free Missions. If the other Baptist Missions 
should ever be divorced from slavery, it will be in consequence 
of their efforts, and especially of their persevering support of 
the Free Mission Society. 



at Obeelin, but the Institution is of too long standing to need a particular notice. 
Oneida Institute, at Whitesboro, N. Y., while it existed, and under the Presidency 
of Bcriah Green, was thoroughly anti-slavery in its character. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 509 



CHAPTER XLI. 

TIIK ANTI-SLAVERY SOCIETIES — THEIR RELATION TO POLITI- 
CAL AND CHURCH ACTION. 

Limited, yet appropriate labor of the National Anti-Slavery Societies — Reasons why 
their operations became more circumscribed — American and Foreign A. S. So- 
ciety — Its course and policy — American Anti-Slavery Society since the division 
in 1S40 — Its exclusive claims and proscription of other organizations — Early indi- 
cations of its policy, political and ecclesiastical — Albany Convention of 1S39 — 
Tone of the Liberator in Jan., 1840 — Of the National Anti-Slavery Standard, after 
the division — Solution of an enigma. 

"While these political and ecclesiastical agitations were in 
progress, it will readily be seen — as might have been antici- 
pated beforehand — that the two Anti-Slavery Societies and 
their auxiliaries could occupy, in respect to those agitations, 
only a subordinate position. Each political and each ecclesi- 
astical movement would be carried on by those more immedi- 
ately interested in it, while the Societies, as such, were not 
prepared to recommend, nor adapted to carry forward, any 
particular measures of political or church action. 

And yet, they were not left altogether without a field of 
appropriate and beneficial action. Though moral considera- 
tions were by no means out of place, in a political movement, 
(as politics should be founded on ethics) and though the moral 
bearings of slavery would, of course, come directly under re- 
view in a discussion of the Church question, yet an appeal 
having no direct reference either to the religious sects or to the 
political parties, would be of great service, and be well adapt- 
ed to exert an influence on many minds unduly sensitive 
when the course of their sects or parties is called in question. 
The Anti-slavery Societies, therefore, in the measure of their 



510 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

limited means, and in proportion to the wisdom and efficiency 
of their management, continued to urge forward the general 
cause. Yet, owing to their dissensions, and other causes, their 
usefulness has been, in a degree, circumscribed, and the State 
and local auxiliaries of the two rival national societies have 
either become extinct, or have fallen into a state of compara- 
tive decline. 

THE AMERICAN AND FOREIGN ANTI-SLAVERY SOCIETY — ITS 
COURSE AND POLICY. 

Since its organization, in 1840, this Society has pursued an 
equable and steady course. If it has not been a pioneer of 
new aggressive movements, ecclesiastical or political, it has 
not chosen the policy of interposing obstacles to them. It 
has been conducted by those who honestly consider themselves 
in occupancy of the original ground, and in the practice of 
the early usages of the American Anti-Slavery Society, at its 
organization, in 1833. Though this will be controverted by 
the leaders of the rival Society, an examination and compari- 
son of documents would perhaps exhibit as near an approxi- 
mation to that ground as could be exhibited elsewhere. If 
the strict letter of the old Society's Constitution does not de- 
scribe their course on the position of females, the early usages 
of the Society may be pleaded as their precedent. Its leading 
members would not, perhaps, claim, that they hold precisely 
the same views that they once held, concerning distinct politi- 
cal action. As a Society, or, as a Committee, they have had 
little or nothing to say, pro or con, in respect to distinct po- 
litical or ecclesiastical organizations of abolitionists. Yet their 
annual reports, from time to time, have embodied important 
political and ecclesiastical records, with interesting and valua- 
ble statistical information connected with slavery, and with 
the progress of the anti-slavery cause. However violently 
they may have been denounced by another class of abolition- 
ists, whatever they may have failed to undertake or to accom- 
plish, whatever differences of opinion may be entertained in 
respect .to the division in 1840, or in respect to their course 
afterwards, impartial history will give them an honorable 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 511 

place among the sincere and laborious friends of the enslaved. 

The writings of William Jay will ever retain a high place in 
the anti-slavery literature of his age and nation, and the 
ceaseless vigilance and untiring activity of Lewis Tappan will 
leave their marks upon every year and month of anti-slavery 
progress. No power of party prejudice, no narrow bigotry, 
not even connected with the most signal services and brilliant 
exploits in the cause of freedom, will ever be able successful- 
ly to write down such names, along with those of their asso- 
ciates, Ilev. Simeon S. Jocelyn, Rev. Theodore S. Wright, Dr. 
J. W. Pennington, &c. &c, as recreants to the anti-slavery 
cause. As there are limits to the dissensions of earnest re- 
formers, so there must also be limits to their power of crip- 
pling and injuring one another, by unjust accusations. 

AMERICAN" ANTI-SLAVERY SOCIETY — ITS COURSE AFTER THE 
DIVISION OF 1840. 

This Society, after the division of 1840, retaining the same 
Constitution and the same name as before, claimed to occupy 
its original position, as at its organization in 1833, and not 
only regarded the new Society as " schismatic " but stigma- 
tized it as untrue to the cause. More than this. The Liberty 
party, distinct in its origin and in its peculiarities, as has been 
shown, from the American and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society, 
has been perse veringly identified with it, in these representa- 
tions, and both together have been characterized as " a hateful 
form of pro-slavery," originating in a desire to shelter the 
pro-slavery churches, to cripple " the only efficient abolition- 
ists," and to crowd off woman from the sphere of anti-slavery 
activity. 

Had these things been said only by a few individuals, on 
their own responsibility, or on the spur of an exciting mo- 
ment, the circumstance might need little or no notice in our 
records. But it is not so. The repetition of these charges 
has been incessant, on both sides of the Atlantic. It has been 
the theme of lecturers and agents, has been embodied in reso- 
lutions, addresses, and annual reports, and has occupied 



512 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

columns upon columns of periodicals devoted to the interests 
of the Society. So prominent a part of the Society's opera- 
tions, has it been, to propagate and repeat these representa- 
tions, that the historical view of the Society that should fail 
to give this feature of it a corresponding prominence, would 
fail to record truthfully its history. 

And since this leading feature of the Society must needs be 
noticed, including the corresponding claim that the American 
Anti-Slavery Society and its auxiliaries represent " the only 
genuine abolitionists in the country," it becomes needful, as a 
matter of historical integrity, to record more minutely than 
would otherwise be requisite, the course of a Society setting 
up such exclusive claims.* While we give due credit for the 
important anti-slavery labors of Mr. Garrison and his asso- 
ciates, before and since the division, we shall be compelled to 
record some particulars — both in respect to their political and 
ecclesiastical position — which may throw light on the validity 
of their exclusive claims. 

Their course since the division of the Society, and the or- 
ganization of the Liberty party, in 1840, should be studied 
in connection with the position held by them at that time and 
for some time previous. 

It has already been seen that Mr. Garrison and his friends 
had taken their stand against voting, not on account of the 
pro-slavery character of the Federal Constitution, but on ac- 
count of their principles as " Non-Resistants " in respect to 
compulsory civil government and penal law. 

* The very last " Annual Report of the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society," 
dated January, 1852 (page 48), designates its partisans as "the only efficient anti- 
slavery men" in America — and represents the " New organization" (meaning the 
American and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society) as having " sprung into existence for 
the protection of pro-slavery churches." It speaks of " the Apostacy of 1840." It 
uses still more offensive language, which we will not repeat, and applies opprobrious 
epithets to distinguished abolitionists on both sides of the Atlantic, by name. Since 
the Report reached us, we have heard a lecturer of the American A. S. Society use 
similar language, expressly including in his remarks " the Liberty party," and boast- 
ing that he and his associates had " broken it down" — threatening also that they 
would break down an Anti-Slavery Society then in process of organizing, unless it 
would become auxiliary to the American A. S. Society. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 513 

It was about the same time, if we correctly remember, that, 
in connection with his new views of the Sabbath, Mr. Garri- 
son threw out hints in disparagement of the commonly re- 
ceived ideas of the Ministry and the Church. The pro-slavery 
position and the authoritative tone of leading ministers in 
Massachusetts and elsewhere, must doubtless be charged with 
no small share of the responsibility of giving rise to these 
views and occasions for the manifestation of them. To some 
extent, they may have grown out of corresponding estimates 
of civil government. Be this as it may, the distaste appears 
to have been entertained against the institutions themselves, 
and not merely against pro-slavery influences aud action in 
them. 

At an Anti-slavery Convention in 1839 or '40, Stephen S. 
Foster, a Garrison abolitionist, introduced into an Anti-slavery 
Convention a resolution denominating the American Churches 
a " brotherhood of thieves." To " come out " from pro-slavery 
churches was soon insisted upon by Mr. Foster and others as 
the duty of the abolitionists connected with them. We do 
not remember that Mr. Garrison expressed any dissent, and 
the general tone of his paper was in harmony with it. 

Yet, at the Albany Convention, in July, 1839, as before 
noticed, the partisans of Mr. Garrison, in his presence, and 
without his dissent, objected to a distinct politital party, 
that it would lead to similar divisions in the churches, and to 
new ecclesiastical organizations by abolitionists. 

Again, January 31, 1840, (before the organization of the 
Liberty party or the division of the American Anti-slavery 
Society) Mr. Garrison, in his Liberator, in reply to " Gerrit 
Smith on political action," held the following language: 

" If we must have a new political party to abolish slavery, must we not 
also have a new religious sect for the same purpose 1 Is the necessity 
greater in the one case than in the other ? Yet, who, among abolition- 
ists is prepared for such a measure ?* As to the right of abolitionists 



* The "measure" had already been a subject of earnest consultation in Albany, 
the July previous, in the morning prayer-meetings, as before noticed. 

33 



514 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

to withdraw from the existing sects and start a rival one to them all, it is as 
indisputable as it is to organize themselves into a separate political party. 
But such a course, we are persuaded, whether pursued politically or 

RELIGIOUSLY, WOULD BE PRODUCTIVE OF SERIOUS MISCHIEF TO THE ANTI- 
SLAVERY cause. Nor is it demanded • by anything in the history of that 
cause. The progress of abolitionism is strong and sure ; and, by its own 
inherent power must and will overcome, ere long, both Church and 
State, as now organized." 

Comparing together these apparently conflicting positions 
of Mr. Garrison and his friends, we can reconcile them only 
by supposing that they wished abolitionists to "come out" 
from the pro-slavery churches, but were not pleased with the 
prospect of their organizing anti-slavery ones. The non- 
voting policy, and the absence of a distinct anti-slavery party 
in politics, would harmonize with this. " The progress of 
abolitionism" would then "overcome the Church and State 
as now organized," but without producing any new organiza- 
tions of them. We are bound in all charity to believe, on 
their own testimony, that such earnest reformers would seek 
to guide and shape reformations in accordance with their own 
views. 

The "National Anti-slavery Standard" — the organ of the 
American Anti-slavery Society, soon after the division in 
IS-tO — held a language equally revolutionary — equally con- 
servative. The very foundations of society were to be over- 
turned. Yet the political parties must not be disturbed ! 

" See if the cause of the division be not closely connected with the na- 
ture of the reform itself. Anti-slavery is a word of mighty power. Oh ! 
IT strikes at the very corner-stones and keystones of society. It 
aims a death-blow et long cherished habits and opinions. It robs life of all 
factitious honors ; but above, and more than all, it would put an end for- 
ever TO THE UNRIGHTEOUS DOMINATION OF ' THE CHURCH.' It WOULD UN- 
SEAT POPULAR THEOLOGY from its throne, break down the barriers 
of sect, and, in short, resolve society into its natural elements, saving 
all the real progress that has been made in the scale of improvement. Here 
is the true issue on which division in our ranks is made up." 

But in the same paper there appeared also the following : 
" The greatest danger, in our opinion, is the organizing of a third polit- 
ical party, striving to BREAK DOWN political organizations." 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 515 

At this same time, and afterwards, the Standard condemned 
anti-slavery church secession and re-organization, as being a 
part of the same policy that organized the Liberty party. It 
repeated this in particular reference to the forming of an inde- 
pendent anti-slavery church in Utica, of which Alvan Stew- 
art, a pioneer of the Liberty party, was a member. 

Now, how are we to decipher and harmonize all this ? Anti- 
slavery, after the model of the "Standard," is to "strike at 
the keystones of society," but it dreads, as the "greatest dan- 
ger," the breaking down of the old pro-slavery political 
parties! It is to "unseat popular theology," and "put an 
end forever to the unrighteous domination of the church" — 
but there must be no secessions with a view to organize anti- 
slavery and reformatory churches ! 

We see only one solution of the enigma. If it were deter- 
mined to " put an end forever" to all civil and ecclesiastical 
institutions, and if their unhappy and unholy connection in 
this country with slavery was to be improved as the excuse 
and occasion for doing this, then the course of the official 
" Standard" becomes at once intelligible and consistent. For 
nothing could so effectually defeat the desired operation as 
the united and successful efforts of abolitionists to redeem 
those institutions from disgrace and subversion by divorcing 
them from slavery, and wielding them for its overthrow, 
which could only be done by organizing new churches and 
political parties, if the existing ones could not be reclaimed. 

A resolution of Mr. Garrison, adopted by the Middlesex 
County Anti-Slavery Society, about this time, demanded that 
" the alliance that now subsists between the religious sects and 
-political parties of the North and South, be INSTANTLY 

BROKEN UP." 

The principle here laid down would require abolitionists to 
secede " instantly" from the existing parties and sects. And 
if organized political and church action were to be, for any 
purposes, continued, it would require them to re-organize. 
But Mr. Garrison was strongly opposed to the efforts making 
in that direction. It seems to follow, that he required of all 



516 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

abolitionists that they should act in accordance with his prin- 
ciples concerning politics and religion, by virtually withdraw- 
ing from the Church and the State. 

" Here," according to the ' Standard,' " is the true issue on 
which division in our ranks is made up," or its language has, 
to us, no intelligible meaning. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 517 



CHAPTER XLII. 

» 

THE AMERICAN ANTI-SLAVERY SOCIETY — ITS FURTHER COURSE 
ON POLITICAL ACTION. 

Political clement in the division of the Societies — Facts in illustration — Position of 
" Non-Resistants" — Position of abolitionists in the old parties remaining with the 
Society — Course of Mr. Garrison — " Moral suasion" abolitionists — Resolutions at 
Worcester and Springfield— Presidential election of 1840— Subsequent develop- 
ments — Opposition to the Liberty Party — State Election in New York — Politioal 
ethics. 

Two resolutions of the Quarterly Meeting of the Old Mas- 
sachusetts Anti-Slavery Society, some time beforehand, were 
understood to portend a revolution of some sort in the Amer- 
ican Anti-Slavery Society, in May, 1840. The previous 
annual meeting had decided in favor of women's voting, yet 
the officers had not resigned, and the business of the Societv 
was going on as usual. What elements then, or what indica- 
tions of a revolution, were foreseen ? 

At the World's Anti-Slavery Convention in London, soon 
after the division in America, the question of admitting women 
to participate in the proceedings, was introduced by some of 
the American delegation. The proposition, being accounted 
an innovation on the customs of British abolitionists, including 
" Friends,"* did not succeed, whereupon. Mr. Garrison and 
some others declined taking seats. 

During the discussion of the question, Wendell Phillips, 

* It will be remembered that "Friends," both in America and England, transact 
their ecclesiastical business in separate meetings of males and females — not by organ- 
izing them together. This usage probably gave rise to the separate organization of 
male and female Anti-Slavery Societies in both hemispheres. 



518 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

Esq., of Boston, a delegate associated with. Mr. Garrison, 
"denied that the woman question had occasioned the late 
division in New York. He said that it was politics that 
occasioned it." 

Without denying, with Mr. Phillips, that the " woman ques- 
tion" was one occasion of division, we may agree with him 
that u politics 1 ' 1 had a large share in the transaction — the politics 
of those who wished in some way to wield civil government 
against slavery — the politics of those who foresaw in this the 
disturbance of their political parties — and the politics (perhaps 
we should say the anti-politics) of those who desired no com- 
pulsory civil government at all. 

The combination, for the time being, between the two latter 
against the first, appears to have presented the political ele- 
ment of division, and their union in the American Anti-Sla- 
very Society, after the division, furnishes the key to the 
political manifestations that followed, including the bitter 
hostility towards the Liberty party for which that Society wty 
distinguished. With a " rank and file" of whig and demo- 
cratic abolitionists, wedded to their old parties, the Society 
was " officered," to some extent, with Non-Resistants, who 
would have preferred to witness in their ranks no voting at 
all, but who were unfortunately led to regard with more for- 
bearance the pro-slavery voting of the whig and democratic 
members of their own Society, than the rigid anti-slavery 
voting of the members of the Liberty party. 

The division in the Society at New York, and the organi- 
zation of the Liberty party, took place, it will be borne in 
mind, in the spring of 1840, on the eve of the Presidential 
election of that year, and in the midst of stirring preparations 
for the contest. The resolution adopted by the Garrisonian 
majority, placing the support of the pro-slavery and the anti- 
slavery candidates on equal grounds of disapprobation, has 
already been mentioned. This was the beginning of a polit- 
ical course for a long time pursued by that Society. It was 
the beginning, but not the consummation ; for before election 
day arrived, it was openly taught that the securing of votes 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 519 

for Harrison and Tyler was less to be deplored than the secur- 
ing of votes for Birney and Earle. This was the language 
of N. P. Rogers, one of their leading editors, and of the agents 
and lecturers of the Society. 

The annual meeting of the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery So- 
ciety, in January or February, 1840, had said nothing against 
the support of Harrison and Tyler, though there was known 
to be a strong tendency of the majority of abolitionists in that 
State to support them. After the nomination of Birney and 
Earle, by the Liberty party, in April, the American Anti- 
Slavery Society, as we have seen, could impartially dissuade 
from .pro-slavery and from anti-slavery voting, in the same 
breath. But now, a decided preference, as a choice of evils, 
was given to the political support of a slaveholder over an abo- 
litionist who had emancipated his slaves. 

The action of the great majority of the society and its sup- 
porters was in accordance with these teachings. Non-Resist- 
ants, who, on the ground of their peculiar views of civil 
government, abstained from the polls, were admitted to be (as 
we have seen) but a small minority of the society and of its 
leading men — " less than an hundredth part of the society" in 
Massachusetts, at the time of the division, there, in 1839 — 
"not exceeding," in 1841, or '42, " one or two hundred in 
all New England," and still more sparse in the other States. 
And nothing, at that time, was heard of abstaining from the 
polls, on the ground of the pro-slavery character of the Fede- 
ral Constitution or the Federal Government. The vast ma- 
jority of the society claiming to embody " the only true aboli- 
tionists of the country" voted either for Van Buren or for 
Harrison and Tyler, opponents of abolitionism, while the Li- 
berty party, designated by them as " apostates," voted for Bir- 
ney, the emancipating abolitionist. 

Some of their active and official members were earnestly 
engaged in electioneering for a slaveholder. A member of 
the "business committee" of the meeting of the Massachusetts 
Anti-Slavery Society just now mentioned, having assisted to 
shape its proceedings, was found, not long afterwards, a pro- 



520 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

minent speaker at political meetings, in support of Harrison 
and Tyler. 

The Executive Board of the same Massachusetts A. S. So- 
ciety, during the pendency of the same presidential election, 
addressed a letter to the abolitionists of the United States, 
against independent anti-slavery nominations, but said nothing 
against the support of the pro-slavery candidates. Like the 
" Standard," they seem to have felt that " the greatest danger 
was the organization of a third party, striving to break down 
political organizations." 

Soon after the nomination of Birney, in April, 1840, the 
same Massachusetts State A. S. Society, held a quarterly meet- 
ing, and adopted six labored resolutions, deprecating the sup- 
port of Birney and Earle, but uttering not a word against the 
support of the pro-slavery candidates. Nothing was said, (as 
formerly) of " scattering votes" at State or National elections, 
nor in favor of staying away from the polls. Of this meeting, 
the same prominent supporter of Harrison and Tyler* was 
chairman. The proceedings of the meeting were published in 
the Liberator without dissent, accompanied with sarcastic men- 
tion of the nomination of Birney, which was spoken of as " the 
Albany farce."— See Liberator, of April 17, 1840. 

Some time before this, (March 13) Mr. Garrison labored, in 
his Liberator, to show that "it is most unphilosophical for abo- 
litionists to expend much, time, expense, or thought, upon the 
approaching presidential election," — that "it matters very little 
who is President" because there is no probability that within 
four years there will be a Congress who will vote for the abo- 
lition of slavery in the District of Columbia. Yet he would 
have abolitionists bear their testimony against elevating either 
of the candidates. 



* Mr. Tyler was a slaveholder. He was elected Vice-President, at this election, 
and, in consequence, became President by the demise of President Harrison. His 
course, as President, we have seen. Gen. Hamson, by his public speeches at Vin- 
cennes and Cheviot, had been one of the earliest and most violent opposers of aboli- 
tionists. By this means, and by his letters to southern politicians, he had gained 
southern favor, and thus he became the Presidential candidate of his party. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 521 

la all this, we heard nothing of the wickedness of voting 
under the pro-slavery constitution. We saw nothing ©f the 
motto of " no union with slaveholders." A close union with 
the supporters of slaveholders was quite evident, nevertheless. 

The previous policy of " questioning the candidates " of the 
old parties, was now, by general consent, laid aside. Liberty 
party men had candidates of their own. Non-Resistants de- 
sired none. And other abolitionists, (whether of the " Old " 
or the " New " organized anti-slavery societies,) appeared to 
be tolerably well content with the candidates furnished them 
by their old political parties. Except the seven thousand 
votes polled for Birney and Earle \>y the Liberty party, and 
perhaps two or three hundred non-voting Non-Resistants,* 
excepting, also, the sect called "Covenanters," who never 
vote, there were not, probably, any considerable number of 
abolitionists who did not, at that election, cast pro-slavery 
votes. 

Now was the noon-tide glory of " moral suasion " abolition- 
ism, as it was called. "We must abolitionize the people,'" 
said the advocates of this doctrine, and all will come right. 
And again, " Do not bring down our holy cause," said they. 
" into the dirty waters of politics." These had a holy horror 
of the Liberty party. They preferred the " Old organization,'' 
and hastened to vote for the pro-slavery candidates of their 
old parties. 

Let it not be inferred that Mr. Garrison and those of his 
associates who were thorough abolitionists, could silently wit- 
ness all this, to the close of the contest, without a word of 
rebuke. It was not so. The Old Massachusetts Anti-Slavery 
Society, though late in the season, at Worcester, October 6th. 
and at Springfield, October 8th, adopted the following, from 
the pen of Mr. Garrison : 

" Resolved, That no man can vote for William H. Harrison, or Martin 



* Some who called themselves Non-Besistanta were scarcely restrained from the 
polls, when election day came. It is confidently said that some of them did vote. 
Be this as it may, the political preferences and influence of some of them was no 
secret. 



522 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

Van Buren, without voting directly to sustain slavery, and he who votes for 
slavery, has no title to the name of an abolitionist." 

Mr. Garrison was himself again. He here repeated the old 
anti-slaverj doctrine, held before the division — the doctrine 
of 1838 — the doctrine that compelled voting abolitionists to 
form the Liberty party. Its severe but just censure lighted 
upon not one single adhering member of that party, accused 
as that party was, of apostacy from genuine abolitionism. 
But it fell, like a thunder-bolt, upon seven-eighths, if not nine- 
tenths of the members of the American Anti-Slavery Society 
and its auxiliaries, to which Mr. Garrison himself belonged, 
and which claimed then, and still claims, to embody or repre- 
sent all the genuine abolitionism in America. 

If it fell equally upon a portion of the rival Society, (the 
" New Organization ") it fell only upon that portion of it that 
failed to come into the Liberty party, thus revealing the dis- 
tinction between them, and also the affinity of political ethics 
between portions of the New Organization and the Old. 

The language of the Resolution justifies the estimate we 
have already made of the advice previously given, in the op- 
posite direction. 

Such a Resolution, at the meetings of the Society in the 
winter and spring, consistently carried out, and not neutral- 
ized by contrary teachings, would have had a salutary effect, 
though it would have swelled the vote of the Liberty party. 
As it was, it came too late to prevent the mortifying result 
already described. It had scarcely reached central and west- 
ern New- York, ere those who needed it had either deposited 
their votes or had committed themselves too deeply to retract. 

Nor did the infatuation die with the Presidential contest. 
It was publicly stated and never denied, that two lecturing 
agents of the American Anti-Slavery Society, professing to 
be non-resistants, boasted, afterwards, that they had saved 
thousands of votes for the whig party ; in other words, for 
Harrison and Tyler. It is known that, in their travels they 
Bought out whig committees, and made such representations 
to them as induced them to subscribe for packages of the " Na- 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 523 

tional Anti-Slavery Standard." " No union with slavehold- 
ers " was not, then, the motto of that paper, nor of the Society 
of which it was the official organ. 

A great convention of "old organization" abolitionists was 
held at Le Roy, N. Y., January 6th and 7th, 1841, under the 
auspices of the Corresponding Secretary and General Agent 
of the Old American Anti-Slavery Society. The proceedings 
were published in more than nine columns of the National 
Anti-Slavery Standard. 

" The largest and most spirited anti-slavery Convention'' (say the editors) 
"ever held in the State of New York." " Several hundred delegates were 
in attendance, and acted without distinction of sex. The third party move- 
ment was voted down by a very large majority, as it had been in four State 
Conventions previously in that State." " We publish the proceedings 
entire." " Send it to the four winds, that it may do the work of primitive 

ABOLITIONISM !" 

In this Convention, as appears in the proceedings, a Reso- 
lution was introduced, discussed, amended, and put into vari- 
ous shapes, upon the subject of voting for slaveholders, but, 
finally, the Resolution was lost. In rejecting it the Convention 
refused to say, in any form, that it was inconsistent to vote for a 
slaveholder ! In all the proceedings, there was no expres- 
sion of regret in view of the course of voting abolitionists, 
except those who voted for the abolition candidate, Mr. Birney. 
Among the letters to the Convention, read and published as 
from " distinguished abolitionists," deprecating the Liberty 
party, w§re several from zealous supporters of Harrison and 
Tyler. 

The proceedings of this Convention were hailed in the Lib- 
erator as a signal triumph of the American Anti-Slavery So- 
ciety over the Liberty party and " new organization." 

By the Liberator and the National Anti-Slavery Standard 
it was apparently assumed as a settled axiom, that politics, of 
necessity, must be impure — that they must be conducted on 
principles of mere expediency, and that moral principle, for 
the time being, must be laid aside. They derided the efforts 
of the Liberty party, its lecturers and its editors, to raise the 



524 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

tone of political morality, to teach the duty of honest consci- 
entious, political action, to be performed religiously, in the 
fear of God, and looking to him for assistance and direction * 
Moral action and political action were spoken of, as antago- 
nisms, that cannot exist together, or be reconciled. 

It was not strange that those who thought thus of political 
action, and then undertook to direct it, should realize, in the 
results, the appropriate effects of their own theory. He is not 
to be regarded an unsuccessful operator whose' work comes up 
to his ideal — his model. 

In the Autumn of 1842, an important State election took 
place in the State of New York, and the agents of the Ame- 
rican Anti-Slavery Society, with the " National Anti-Slavery 
Standard," were again in the field, in opposition to the Liber- 
ty party, its editors, its lecturers, and its candidates. 

The " Standard" of July 7, took the ground that abolition- 
ists should not insist on the " genuine" abolition of those for 
whom they were called upon to cast their votes. They were 
not to insist on " filling the State House with true anti-slavery 
men." Instead of this, they were advised to make calcula- 
tions whether or no " fifty men who have a strong motive for 
obliging abolitionists," would not do us more service than a 
few abolitionists who are anti-slavery to the back-bone ?" 

The comparison here instituted describes and concedes the 
distinction between the candidates of the Liberty party, and 
the candidates of the old parties, whom other voting aboli- 
tionists would have to support. The choice was between the 
two, and the suggestion was in favor of the latter. 

In the same paper, of Sept. 29th, an effort was made to per- 
suade abolitionists to vote for a gubernatorial candidate who 
was a partisan of Henry Clay. , 

" Politics is a game of expediency, its science consists in a nice calcula- 
tion of present availability. Those skilled in such calculations can decide 



* " ' Under certain circumstances,' Mr. Goodell thiuks, ' that the days of approach- 
ing the ballot-box, and of preparing for its solemn duties, might be set apart as days 
of fasting and prayer to Almighty God, by those who are accustomed to observo 
such appointments.' Pardon us, if we smile at this."— Liberator, March 20, 1840. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 525 

for themselves, whether Luther Bradish, as Governor, would be likely to 
do more to support Henry Clay, than Luther Bradish, as a private citizen." 

It might have been added, that those abolitionists who had 
openly supported Harrison and Tyler, could have no consci- 
entious scruples against supporting Henry Clay. 

In the same paper, of the same date, was inserted, without 
comment or dissent, a long letter from a Whig statesman, 
William Slade, of Vermont, in which he justifies the policy 
of making the tariff question the paramount one, for the time 
being, instead of the slave question; and then adds as 
follows : 

" May not abolitionists better subserve the cause of abolition by thus 
aiding to secure the election of men who are willing to take moderate 
ground against slavery, than to lose their influence, as to present practical 
purposes, by shutting themselves up within the straightened enclosure of a 
third political party I" 

Such was the political morality inculcated and exemplified 
by the official organ of the American Anti-Slavery Society, 
up to the autumn of 1842, on the eve of an important State 
election, and looking forward to the Presidential campaign of 
18-14. Posterity will compare such political ethics with those 
of the Liberty party, and decide upon the claims of the former 
to represent the only true abolitionism of America, and whe- 
ther the latter gave evidence of apostacy from the anti-slavery 
cause, in not acting with them. 



526 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 



CHAPTER XLIII. 

SECOND REVOLUTION IN THE POSITION AND POLICY OF THE 
AMERICAN ANTI-SLAVERY SOCIETY, IN 1844. 

"No Union with Slaveholders"— The Federal Constitution "a covenant with death 
and an agreement with hell"— Import of the "No Union" motto— Some advan- 
tages of this new position — Its origin and history. 

Passing over an intervening space of about one year and 
a half, we find the American Anti-Slavery Society, at its 
annual meeting in May, 1844, raising the flag of a No Union 
with Slaveholders,"* demanding a dissolution of the Union, 



* It has not always been easy for other abolitionists to understand precisely what, 
and how much, is included by Mr. Garrison and his associates, under the phrase, 
" No union with slaveholders." If they mean only a separation of the non-slave- 
holding States from the slave States, the meaning w§uld be sufficiently clear, and 
the proposal deserves attention. But such a separation would not be a separation 
between the pro-slavery and the anti-slavery portions of the nation. It would 
leave the slaves, free colored people of the South, and many of their white friends 
on the South side of the line ; while many of the most despotic statesmen and ser- 
vile voters would remain on the North side. It would leave the " black law" legis- 
lation of the free States in full force. Neither morally nor politically would the 
geographical line of division describe the true separation. Appeals sometimes made 
in favor of " no union with slaveholders," seem to overlook this. It seems to have 
been assumed that the relation of a common citizenship between a slaveholder and 
a friend of liberty is, per se, a sinful relation — that it is wicked to sit in the same 
Congre33 -hero a slaveholder sits, or to go to the same ballot-box with him. This 
idea w >**' . ace?!?! with the theory of no civil government. Its adoption would 
render civil go\ Sr'iment impossible, so long as there remained a wicked lawless man 
in the nation ; iir other words, so long as a civil government, to repress crime, is 
needed. This idea also assumes that civil government is merely a voluntary associa- 
tion, into which the citizen may enter, or not, as he pleases. This too accords with 
the non-government theory, and its advocates doubtless understand themselves as 
];<»Idiug no political connections either with slaveholders, or with any body else. The 
separation, ©u their part, involves no self-denial, and consists in no new or dis- 
criminative act. To those of other views, who hold themselves in fact, whether 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 527 

denouncing the Federal Constitution as pro-slavery, " a cove- 
nant with death, and an agreement with hell," under which no 
abolitionist can consistently hold office, or vote for another to 
hold office. This was a memorable revolution in the Society 
and its policy. 

In many respects there was an advantage gained by the 
Society in taking this new ground. The favorite policy of 
not voting could now be placed on an anti-slavery basis, and 
openly urged " on the anti-slavery platform," with the aid of 
anti-slavery funds, instead of depending upon the still mod- 
erate number of " Non-Resistauts," who were consistent 
enough to abandon the polls. The experiment of keeping 
other abolitionists away from the polls had proved, thus far, 
a manifest failure.* The anti-slavery reputation of the So- 
ciety, as well as the interests of the cause, had suffered severely, 
and the lost ground must be regained. The startling doctrines 
and measures thus propounded would arrest attention and 
excite discussion. Instead of lagging behind the Liberty 
party, and hanging on to the skirts of the old pro-slavery 
parties and their slaveholding candidates, they could now 
claim to outstrip them in the march of separation from slave- 
holders, and retort upon them the charge of inconsistency in 
their political associations.! How far, or whether at all, these 
considerations had weight, we pretend not to say. They 
naturally suggest themselves on a review of the history. The 
reader will judge. 



they will or no, a part of the nation they reside in, some of their appeals have there- 
fore no force. But when they urge the duty of dissolving the Union between the 
free and slave States, on the ground that the Union upholds slavery, they propound 
a serious and intelligible question, and one that comes home to the conscience and 
interests of every northern citizen. 

* So well known and almost universal was the desire to vote, that Stephen S. 
Foster and some others, it is understood, proposed among their associates some 
mode of anti-slavery voting, distinct from the obnoxious Liberty party. But either 
the proposal was overruled, or no other platform of anti-slavery voting could be 
devised. 

+ In October, 1842, a Liberty Party Convention at Syracuse, N. Y., had issued a 
circular describing the political influence of the American Anti-Slavery Society, 
which was not to be conveniently answered till the course of the Society was 
changed. 



528 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

So radical a change could not have been effected in a mo- 
ment. A strong under-current must have been at work during 
the enactment of the scenes before described. The particulars 
are not fully before us, and we have little space for them. 
We are told that Wendell Phillips, Esq., first affirmed the 
pro-slavery character of the Federal Constitution and the 
inconsistency of voting under it, at a Convention in Dover, 
N. H., in October, 1841.* Mr. Garrison is said to have 
expressed in conversation, at that time, his dissent. It is be- 
lieved that he once held the anti-slavery character of the 
Constitution, along with N. P. Eogers and S. J. May. 

But at the next anniversary of the Society in New York, 
May, 1812, the proposition was brought forward by Mr. Gar- 
rison himself. His annunciation of it beforehand, caused 
some excitement, and the Executive Committee in New York 
were alarmed. A note of disavowal was sent by them to the 
pro-slavery editor of the N. Y. Courier and Enquirer, stating 
that the committee did not approve the annunciation — that 
Mr. Garrison was not the Society, &c, or words of that 
import. 

Two years afterwards, May, 1811, after an earnest debate, 
a majority of those present at the annual meeting adopted the 
new policy, and many withdrew from the Society, f The 
change in the course of the Society thenceforward was strongly 
marked, and the tone of the " National Anti-Slavery Stand- 
ard," under the charge of other editors, also changed. 

The political history of the Society, however, does not end 
here. But we must digress a little at this point to notice 
another schism in the Society. 



* We are not quite certain of the accuracy of some of these dates, but think them 
sufficiently early. 

t Whether it was ou this occasion, or before, or afterwards, we cannot say, but at 
one period two or more lecturers of the Society found it difficult to pronounce the 
new shibboleth of a " pro-slavery Constitution" having been so long accustomed to 
promulgate the contrary doctrine, as learned from N. P. Rogers and Samuel J. May, 
in 1836. The Federal Courts were cited on the other side, but theirs was interested 
testimony, and ought not to have been received. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 529 



CHAPTER XLIV. 

FURTHER DIFFICULTIES IX THE AMERICAN* ANTI-SLAVERY 
SOCIETY. 

Natural working of the new theories concerning Church and State — N. P. Rogers — 
His inflexible adherence to his theory — The Collision. 

The particulars that follow may illustrate the effects of ex- 
cessive exclusiveness among reformers. They may also throw 
light on that phase of attempted reformation that seems to 
look in the direction of displacing all organized control ii. 
human society. 

Some of the leading minds in the American Anti-Slavery 
Society, after the division of 1840, were understood to repu- 
diate the ideas commonly expressed by the term " Church" 
and the term "State" as regularly constituted organizations. 
It seemed to many, however, that their cherished organizations, 
the Non-Kesistant Society and the Anti-Slavery Society, to- 
gether or separate, constituted, to them, both a Church and a 
State, — the union of Church and State being of the most in- 
timate kind, amounting to identity; the discipline and polity 
being of the most rigorous and stringent character — the ana- 
thema tremendous — the infliction precipitate and unsparing. 
The absence of any other Church or any other State, would 
naturally tend to concentrate and vitalize, at this central point, 
whatever of the governing propensity in human nature (if 
there be any) that remained in them. This was believed to 
be the case. 

If it were so, the fact would be likely to develop itself 
among the subjects of this government. Attracted within its 

34 



OoC GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

jurisdiction by perhaps an excessive dread of subordination, 
they would be likely to feel it the more keenly, if it should 
ever happen to be exercised upon themselves. The contin- 
gency was not long lingering. 

Nathaniel P. Rogers, Esq., of New Hampshire, was a man 
of genius — of strong mental powers — an original and rapid 
thinker- — a racy and vigorous writer — a non-resistant — and an 
abolitionist of the Garrison school. For a time he edited the 
National Anti-Slavery Standard, New York, then again the 
Herald of Freedom at Concord, N. H. In energy of purpose 
and weight of talent, he was second to no man among his 
associates, except Mr. Garrison — perhaps not second to him. 
He held himself subordinate to no man. There may have 
been a latent and unconscious rivalry between the two. To- 
gether, and with the concurrence perhaps of one other, a 
lady, the Society was easily managed. Pitted against each 
other, Greek against Greek, there must be schism. 

With N. P. Rogers, his phase of abolition and his theory of 
non-government were no empty abstractions. At least he 
could not consent to be governed. He had not abjured the 
Church, to recognize a Bishop, nor the State, to bow before a 
Throne, or to any power, male or female, behind it. He 
spurned, as instinctively, and as indignantly, the rules of 
order observed in Anti-slavery Conventions and annual meet- 
ings, as he would those of Senates or Synods. When he 
spoke, as he often did with great power, he would not confine 
himself to reported resolutions. In Executive Committees 
he saw Sanhedrims, in Presidents of Societies, Popes, in re- 
corded minutes, precedents, in Constitutions of voluntary as- 
sociations, forms of government. These, as a consistent Non- 
Resistant and lover of liberty, he abjured. He became "a 
disorganizer" in the view of some who had been stigmatized 
as disorganizes themselves. In meetings of the Society, these 
points became matters of earnest debate. On one occasion 
of the kind, at Concord, in 1811, we were incidentally a wit- 
ness, while Stephen S. Foster maintained against Rogers the 
claims of order, organization, and official prerogative. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 531 

The same sentiment forbade that Mr. Rogers should re- 
cognize the supervision of his "Herald of Freedom" by the 
Executive Committee of the New Hampshire Anti-Slavery 
Society, that claimed it as their organ. " I have to edit the 
Herald," said he, " and what I have to do, nobody else is to 
do or direct for me." A dispute aros* concerning the con- 
i rol and the proprietorship of the paper. The merits of the 
case we do not know ; but both sides had their warm parti- 
sans. The controversy was carried to Boston. Mr. Garrison 
was among those who took sides against Mr. Rogers. The 
paper went out of his hands, but he started another of the 
same name, and maintained a controversy while he lived, for 
his health declined and he died, but not until the breach had 
extended beyond the boundaries of New England. Where- 
ever there were supporters of the American Anti-Slavery So- 
ciety in central and western New York, there were found 
some who sympathized with Rogers. The denunciations of 
his opponents against him were quite as severe as anything 
that had ever been fulminated against the " new organization" 
and the Liberty party. How the breach in the Society was 
healed — if it be healed — we cannot exactly say, but the pen- 
alty of insubordination and "schism," under the administra- 
tion of the American Anti-Slavery Society, is now well un- 
derstood. Its governors have evinced their capacity to bear 
rule. 



5S2 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 



CHAPTER XLV. 

POLITICAL COURSE OF THE AMERICAN ANTI-SLAVERY SOCIETY 
SINCE ITS REVOLUTION OF 1844 

The Society not wholly composed of " Non-Resistants" — Position of its politicians — 
Welcomed as members of the Society — Commonly connected with the old political 
parties — Consequent standard of their political action, as compared with the Lib- 
erty party, or with the motto of " No Union with Slaveholders" — On a level with 
the mere " Wilmot Proviso" politicians, or the platform of the Free Soil party — 
Their reception of the nomination of Mr. Van Buren, in 184S — Charges of apos- 
tacy against those Liberty Party men who came into the same measure — Relation 
of " Non-Resistants" in the Society to this political standard of their associates — 
Their policy read in the light of their theory — Facts in confirmation — Embarrass- 
ments of political abolitionists in consequence of this opposition. 

It may, perhaps, be inferred, from the features of the revo- 
lution of 1844, that the American Anti-Slavery Society was 
afterwards or is now .composed wholly of abolitionists who 
decline political voting — some on the principles of the Non- 
Resi stance Society, and some or all on the ground of "no 
union with slaveholders," and the " pro-slavery Constitution 
of the United States." 

Such a conclusion would be wide of the mark. The society 
that, on the ground of these features, (so recently acquired,) 
claims to be and to have been, since 1840, the only true Anti- 
Slavery organization in America, contains political voting 
members still. How numerous they are, or what proportion 
of the entire body, we say not, now: — but it contains them. 
It welcomes them. It chooses to retain them. By its agents 
it invites the co-operation of such, assuring them that the 
" anti-slavery platform is as broad as ever — broad enough to 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 533 

receive those who vote under the Federal Constitution as well 
as those who decline doing so.'* 

And this is not all. It has no rules and it desires none, for 
excluding those who vote for slavery, and even for slavehold- 
ers. We have the authority of Mr. Garrison in his Liberator, 
for saying this, although he declared, in his Springfield and 
Worcester Resolutions, in 18-10 — before cited — that such a 
voter " has no title to the name of an abolitionist" 

When reminded by a Liberty League correspondent that 
the American Anti-Slavery Society, as well as other anti-sla- 
very societies, contained pro-slavery voters and members of 
pro-slavery churches, he denied not the fact, and pleaded that 
the original Constitution of the Society, which remained un- 
changed, did not exclude them, but only excluded slavehold- 
ers. He went further, and vindicated the policy, even at that 
late day, maintaining, in substance, that assent to the anti- 
slavery principles of the Society was the proper test of mem- 
bership, and that each member must be left free to judge 
whether or no he honored his principles in his, practice, so long 
as he did not become a slaveholder. He might vote for slave- 
holders, and hold religious fellowship with them, and remain 
in the Society. 

In the light of this avowal, the exclusive claims of the 
American Anti-Slavery Society to purity of membership may 
be tested. The relation of the Society to politics, since 18-A4, 
may also be understood. 

The Society is not a Society of self-disfranchised non-voters, 
after all, as the " Covenanters " are. While some of its mem- 
bers hold that position, others of them do not. In the matter 
of membership, it is not a test. To the merits of that posi- 
tion, whatever they may be, the Society, as such, has no valid 
claim. 

Still further, the test of membership in that Society — as in 



* This language was lately held, in our hearing, at Rochester, by Mr. S. S. Foster, 
agent of the Society, who was laboring to persuade an Anti-Slavery Society then 
organizing, and composed chiefly of political voters, to become auxiliary to the 
American A. S. Society. 



534 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

others — opens the door to those voters who, in Mr. Garrison's 
view, " have no title to the name of abolitionists. 11 How then 
does he ascertain the claims of the Society to the name of 
abolitionist, in contrast with the claims of other societies ? He 
need not institute a comparison with the Liberty party, which 
contains no such voters. 

The Society is composed, to an unknown extent, of politi- 
cal voters* — perhaps of pro-slavery voters. In the Society 
they have an equal right with Mr. Garrison and faithful abo- 
litionists. How then does the motto of "no union with slave- 
holders " expurgate the Society ? Is there no union with 
slaveholders in a voluntary and fraternal union with those who 
vote for them ? 

Being composed, to a certain extent, of political voters, the 
Society must have a standard of political ethics and action. 

It has one. How does it compare with the standard of 
other anti-slavery societies, and with the standard of the Lib- 
erty party ? 

No anti-slavery society that we know of has a lower stand- 
ard, in this respect, than the American Society. The Liberty 
party has a much higher one. 

Political voters connected with the American Anti-Slavery 
Society, since 1844, it may be presumed, with possible excep- 
tions, have not voted with the Liberty party. The dread of 
being branded " apostates," if nothing else, will have restrained 
them from that. 

For whom, then, have they been casting their votes? And 
Avhat tone of political ethics has been indicated by their 
voting ? 

The candidates of the Liberty party, before its incipient ab- 
sorption into the embroyo Free Soil party, in the autumn of 



* It is not known that the number of non-voting Non-Resistants has increased 
since they were estimated at "one or two hundred in all New England." Some 
prominent advocates of the doctrine have resumed voting. We know of few who 
abstain from the polls on account of the " pro-slavery Constitution," but there are 
some. If political voters do not compose a majority of the supporters of the Society, 
it must be feebler than we have supposed it to be. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 

1847, were always pledged to the abolition of slavery in the 
District of Columbia, and Territories, the prohibition of the 
inter-State Slave trade, and the non-extension of Slavery. 
This was the old demand of abolitionists. The Liberty 
League, and the remnant of the Liberty party since the 
absorption, have gone farther, demanding the abolition of 
Slavery in the States — the highest standard of political 
abolitionism. 

Have the candidates receiving the votes of members of the 
American Anti-Slavery Society, since 1844, been pledged to 
the measures of even the old Liberty party ? 

To ask such a question is to answer it. Though the tone 
of anti-slavery feeling in portions of the Whig and Demo- 
cratic parties has been rising, their candidates have not been 
pledged to these measures. 

The measures of the Free Soil party, and the pledges of its 
candidates, have already been described. The Annual Report 
of the Old Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society, for 1852, 
affords a similar description. It designates the standard of 
that party as falling short of the demands of consistent aboli- 
tionism. It is so, precisely at those points wherein it falls 
short of the position of the Liberty party, as just now re- 
corded. 

But the very highest standard indicated by the votes of 
members of the American Anti-Slavery Society, even since 
1844, is that of the Free Soil party, or that of certain mem- 
bers of the Whig and Democratic parties. To no higher stand- 
ard of voting could Mr. Garrison himself point them, ivithout 
advising them to vote for the candidates of the Liberty party. 

But this he has not done. It follows that the highest stand- 
ard of political action countenanced by the American Anti- 
Slavery Society, even since its revolution in 1844, has been 
lower than that of the old Liberty party. 

Since 1844, as truly as in 1842, the influence of that So- 
ciety upon its political voters has been to lead them not to 
"insist" on the "genuine" abolition of those for whom they 



536 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

cast their votes, but to prefer voting for those who "have 
a strong motive for obliging abolitionists." 

The lower standard of political abolitionism has uniformly 
been preferred by the Society and its leading members to the 
higher. And the voting members of the Society, when voting 
with any reference at all to the slave question, have voted ac- 
cordingly. Let facts testify. 

When certain " progressive" whigs and democrats espoused 
"the "VVilmot proviso," they constituted the only political ele- 
ment then in the country adverse in any degree to the as- 
cendency of slavery, except the Liberty party. For this 
these statesmen deserved due honor, but they did not come 
up to the higher political ethics and demands of the Liberty 
party. The leading influences and the voting members of 
the American Anti-Slavery Society supported the former 
(though standing in their pro-slavery parties, and sometimes 
voting for slaveholders) in preference to the latter. 

Did this course honor their new flag of "No union with 
slaveholders?" 

Measure the distance between the platform of mere " Wil- 
mot proviso" and that of the Liberty party, pledged to the 
abolition of slavery, and you have the distance at that period, 
between the political ethics of a voting Garrison abolitionist, 
and a voter in the Liberty party. The former voted only 
against, the extension of slavery — the latter against its exten- 
sion and in favor of its abolition. 

The lower standard was again preferred to the higher, when 
indications appeared of the organizing of a " Free Soil party." 
That measure encountered none of the virulent opposition 
that had been manifested against the formation of the Liberty 
party. 

And yet again, when the question presented itself, of the 
absorption of the Liberty party in the Free Soil party, the 
same preference was again witnessed — though amid some con- 
fusion of tongues, as different aspects of the transaction pre- 
sented themselves. The leaders of the American Anti-Slavery 
Society could not fail to see that in such a movement the 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. .Vl? 

members of the Liberty party would lower down their stand- 
ard of political abolitionism, and the first impulse was to re- 
proach them for their defection. " Leading Liberty party 
men" said they "are preparing to desert the slave. Have wc 
not always said they would prove untrue?" A secon'd glance 
revealed to them the fact that in such a movement the mem- 
bers of the Liberty party would be coming into close political 
affinity with the " Wilmot proviso" voters in the old Ameri- 
can Anti-Slavery Society. Above all, the troublesome Liberty 
party would be crippled', perhaps disbanded. " Liberty party 
men" said they "are coming to their senses." "We have 
strong hopes of this new movement." 

"We may fail to recall the precise words, but the import of 
both these conflicting comments came close on the heels of 
each other in the Liberator and Standard. 

At the Free Soil nomination of Martin Van Buren at Buf- 
falo in 1848, Rev. Samuel J. May, a "non-resistant" aboli- 
tionist, a leader from the beginning of the "old organization," 
gave his approbation of the movement in a speech, and in- 
voked upon it the blessing of Heaven in prayer. At no 
Liberty party nomination that we know of, was his approving 
voice ever heard or his prayers offered. Thus deep into "the 
dirty waters of politics," he could not have descended. Yet 
Samuel J. May is one of the most liberal minded men, one 
of the most earnest abolitionists, in the Society to which he 
belongs. 

And after all this, at a convention of all descriptions of 
abolitionists at Syracuse, (the residence of Samuel J. May) 
an abolitionist of the Garrison school vehemently insisted 
upon the rottenness of the Liberty party, and adduced, in a 
way of evidence and illustration, the fact that so large a por- 
tion of it had lowered down the high and holy standard of 
abolitionism, by becoming absorbed in the Free Soil party! 
He seemed to forget that in this transition — however it was 
to be described — they had come upon the highest platform 
of political action ever sanctioned by the "old organization" 
— that the high and holy standard of abolitionism apostatized 



538 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

from, was that of the old "one idea" Liberty party — though 
even this was not deemed as Utopian and ultra as that of the 
Liberty league. 

The question forces itself upon our attention : How can 
such radical abolitionists as Mr. Garrison and his associates 
undoubtedly are, prefer that those who do make use of the 
ballot box, should espouse a lower instead of a higher stand- 
ard of political abolitionism ? 

It seems hardly compatable with their known sagacity and 
characteristic dread of compromise to suppose that they fall 
in with the shallow policy of attempting to achieve great ends 
by temporizing expedients. 

Their views of the Federal Constitution and of the limited 
powers of the Federal Government, cannot account for it. 
Though they decline voting themselves, they willingly and 
without conscientious scruple, make political suggestions for 
the guidance of those who do vote. They have not ques- 
tioned the constitutional powers of Congress over the slavery 
of the Federal District, the Territories, and the inter-state 
slave trade — as well as the non-extension of slavery. Yet we 
have seen them steadily prefer that voting abolitionists should 
rally on the latter issue alone, rather than that they should 
include likewise the former and the more important. Politi- 
cally, they are non-extensionists, rather than abolitionists. 

If it be said that they had hopes of accomplishing the one 
and not the other, we repeat that such ..compromises and ex- 
pedients do not come within the scope of their accustomed 
activities and methods. 

It must be remembered that they are non-resistants as well 
as abolitionists. They believe that slavery is wicked ; but 
they believe, too, that -the compulsory abolition of slavery 
by the strong arm of civil government, would also be wicked. 
How then can they consistently or conscientiously advise effi- 
cient political action for the compulsory abolition of slavery? 
An incident or two will show the pertinency of the question. 

When the platform of the proposed Liberty league was 
published, it encountered, of course, the searching scrutiny 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 539 

of Mr. Garrison. He evidently saw that it was free from 
some of the objections that had been made against the Liberty 
party, and that it was adapted to find favor with the most 
radical class of such reformers as make use of the ballot box. 
It was equally plain that he did not wish them to fall in with 
it. He found no fault with its proposed objects — abolition, 
free trade, &c. It became necessary to state his objections. In 
doing this, the key-note of all his political advice was clearly 
revealed. lie objected distinctly to the compulsory action of 
civil government, even for the abolition of slavery. And, 
with some seeming warmth he affirmed, that if the penman 
of the document, his old friend, were placed in the position 
of Chief Magistrate, he could not carry out the measure with- 
out a practical rejection of Christianity in using physical 
force. 

The same sentiment was again uttered distinctly, by Mr. 
Garrison and Henry C. Wright, at the anniversary of the 
American Anti-Slavery Society, May, 1851, at Syracuse. A 
discussion with Liberty party men concerning political action 
against slavery, drove them, at last, to that position. 

If this had been understood on both sides, and kept in mind, 
from the beginning, much angry and misdirected altercation 
might have been spared. If it can be remembered hereafter, 
it may prevent similar wranglings, in time to come. 

Non-Resistants do not seek to suppress crime — not even the 
crime of slaveholding, by the strong arm of civil government. 
Their appeal is rather to the slaveholder. They would have 
the slave-laws repealed : but they understand that, under a 
compulsory civil government, such a repeal would be followed, 
if needful, by the forcible suppression of slaveholding. For 
this they are not prepared, and cannot be, while they remain 
Non-Eesistants. They are shut up (if consistent) to mere mo- 
ral suasion. This is their field. Let them occupy it without 
being reproached. They have a right to their own principles 
and to corresponding measures. 

Abolitionists believing (as most abolitionists do) in a com- 
pulsory civil government, have an equal right to their own 



540 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

principles and measures. If they understand themselves, they 
will not follow the political advice of those who do not seek 
the compulsory suppression of slaveholding. For refusing 
such advisers, they do not deserve to be denounced as untrue 
to the slave ; nor denied the honorable name of abolitionists 
because they do really seek the abolition of slavery* and not 
merely the emancipation of the slaves. 

Among the obstacles which political abolitionists in Ameri- 
ca have been called to encounter, one of the most formidable 
and perplexing (because, by many, unperceived) has been the 
influence of political advisers, earnest emancipationists, who 
have believed it toiclced to suppress slaveholding by a government 
wielding physical force. Had they always and steadily exhibited 
the ethical foundations of their political advice, that advice 
would have been understood, and there would have been no 
occasion for complaint. 

If the boast, already begun by lecturing agents of the 
American Anti-Slavery Society, Non-Eesistants, that they 
have broken down the Libert}' - party, should prove well- 
founded or prophetic, the reader will see how, on what prin- 
ciples, by what methods, and with what auxiliaries, the work 
was, or will have been, accomplished. And posterity will 
judge how much the exploit facilitated the abolition of Ameri- 
can slavery, or vindicated the claims of the victors to the title 
of " the only true abolitionists in the country." 

• Those who would understand the history of political aboli- 
tionism in America — its origin — its nature — its objects — its 
obstacles — its future prospects — will find no occasion to com- 
plain that we have detained them too long on this topic. Its 
study will furnish them with a key to many intricacies other- 
wise inexplicable. 

* The phrase " abolition of slavery" in strictness of speech, as well as in popular 
usage, expresses the act of repealing the slave code, and suppressing the practice of 
slaveholding. This was the " abolition of slavery" in the British West Indies. If 
all the slaveholders in America should emancipate all their slaves to-day, that would 
not be the abolition of American slavery. Slaves might be held again to-morrow. 
Non-Resistants opposed to slavery, are properly emancipationists. We will call 
them abolitionists, if they prefer it, but in doing so we must use the word in a new 
and accommodated signification. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 541 



CHAPTER XLVI. 

COURSE OF MR. GARRISON", AND THE AMERICAN ANTI-SLAVERY 
SOCIETY AND ITS MEMBERS, SINCE THE DIVISION IN 1840, IN 
RESPECT TO ANTI-SLAVERY CHURCH ACTION. 

Sympathizers with the " Clerical Appeal" — an inconsiderable and local minority of 
the Liberty party— Unhappy ecclesiastical connections (nevertheless), of u majority 
of its members — Same inconsistency found in the American A. S. Society — Anti- 
Slavery Church agitations, extensive, but overlooked by the Journalists of the So- 
ciety — Anti-Slavery Church and Missionary re-organization little noticed by them — 
Position of the Amer. Society — Of its members who desire no Church relations — 
Causes which repulsed many Church members from that Society — Ecclesiastical 
position of those members of the Society who do sustain Church relations. Con- 
nection with pro-slavery bodies — Few Anti-Slavery re-organizations, or agitations 
to that end — Other side of the picture — Anti-Slavery Universalists — Testimony of 
Mr. Garrison. 

We have seen that Mr. Garrison and his associates in the 
American Anti-Slavery Society, at an early day, discounte- 
nanced withdrawal from pro-slavery parties and churches, with 
a view to the- organizing of new ones; — that they neverthe- 
less, at the same time, favored and raised the cry, to " come 
out," of pro -slavery churches — that then, and since, to the pre- 
sent time, they have perse veringly charged upon the Ameri- 
can and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society (with which they con- 
nect the Liberty party), "that it sprung into existence for the 
protection of pro-slavery churches" — claiming for themselves 
and their Society the exclusive credit of fidelity to the slave, 
in this particular. 

Here are claims to be scrutinized, charges to be examined, 
apparent discrepancies to be reconciled, or accounted for. 

The facts of the case must be impartially presented. In no 
other way can these problems be solved, or posterity put in 



542 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

possession of any trustworthy history of the anti-slavery move- 
ment in America. This we shall endeavor to do, so far as our 
limits will permit. 

We have already said that those abolitionists in New Eng- 
land, who sympathized with the ''Clerical Appeal," in its ten- 
derness towards pro-slavery ministers, took ground against Mr. 
Garrison and were drawn into the "New Organization" — per- 
haps some of them into the Liberty party. Hence the claims 
and representations to which we have referred. But these 
were only a small part of the New Organization — a very small 
part, certainly, of the Liberty party. 

We have also said that a large portion of the Liberty party, 
including, of course, a considerable number of those who pre- 
ferred (on the whole) the "New" to the "Old" Society after 
the division, continued in their old Churches, (many if not 
most of them pro-slavery,) and that this, in our view, was 
among the causes why the majority of the Liberty party could 
not perseveringly maintain the high standard of political ethics 
which gave rise to that party. 

With this full and free statement concerning the party with 
which we have acted, we must be permitted to connect another 
concerning those who stood aloof from that party, who oppo- 
sed it, and who belonged to " the Old Organization" with Mr. 
Garrison. 

According to the best information we have ever been able 
to collect, the portion of the American Anti-Slavery Society 
who wish to sustain any Church relations at all, are quite as com- 
monly and as extensively (in proportion to numbers) connected 
with pro-slavery churches as abolitionists connected with the 
" New" (the American and Foreign) Anti-Slavery Society, or 
the Liberty party.* 



* It may be said (as it has been,) that those who withdraw from pro-slavery politi- 
cal parties, and yet cling to pro-slavery Churches, are less consistent than those that 
cling to both. And it may be retorted, that those who withdraw from pro-slavery 
political parties, exhibit, at least, one more phase of progress than those who cling to 
both. It may further be said, that in sects maintaining some degree of local Church 
independency, yet remotely related to large ecclesiastical bodies, the character of the 
body, the nature of the relation, and the prospect of a salutary change, are not as 
readily ascertained as in the two great political parties. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM.' 543 

Our own strong impression is, that, in respect to the Liberty 
party, (especially as it now stands) the difference is greatly on 
the other side. A large portion of its members are members 
of anti-slavery churches. 

The agitation in the churches has been a very important 
part of the anti-slavery movement, especially where Christian 
abolitionists, to so wide an extent, and for so long a time, 
have associated themselves for the purpose of holding Chris- 
tian Anti-Slavery Conventions, sustaining lecturers, circu- 
lating books, papers, and tracts, with a direct view to bring 
the churches into an anti-slavery position, or, in case of fail- 
ure (as has been the general fact),, to secede and gather new 
churches. The extent to which this has been done (as briefly 
recorded already), has been sufficient, one would think, to 
deserve some approving record in the official organs and other 
leading journals of "the only" trustworthy Anti-Slavery So- 
ciety in America, the Society that claims to be distinguished 
from all other organizations for fidelity on the church ques- 
tion ; and that charges its rival with having "sprung into 
existence for the protection of pro-slavery churches." Com- 
mon justice would seem to have required at the hands of such 
a Society and such journalists, that so dark a picture should 
be relieved by a presentation of any important facts of a more 
encouraging character. The readers, in Europe, of their Lib- 
erator, their National Anti-Slavery Standard, and their Annual 
Reports, might have been interested to know that among the 
proscribed and anathematized class of abolitionists, some such 
manifestations had been witnessed. But so far as we have 
been able to learn, this class of important facts have been 
almost 'wholly ignored or overlooked by them. 

When General Associations, General Assemblies, General 
Conferences, smaller ecclesiastical bodies, Missionary Boards, 
&c, &c, embracing a majority opposed to abolitionists, have 
met, and debated, and taken action, or refused to take any, 
the facts have not escaped due notice from them. But when 
abolitionists connected with those bodies have banded them- 
selves together for efficient anti-slavery agitation and action 



544 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

among the constituencies of such bodies ; when new mission- 
ary boards, new churches, and extended ecclesiastical bodies, 
have been organized on anti-slavery principles, very little, if 
any, recognition or notice has been taken of such facts by the 
leaders and organs of the American Anti-Slavery Society.* 
The historian must l#ok elsewhere than to the columns of 
their journals and the pages of their annual reports, for infor- 
mation concerning this movement. He must seek it in the 
papers of the Liberty party, and in the religious papers con- 
ducted by those engaged in these enterprises. If it be said 
that the records of these extensive movements were too 
voluminous for the Liberator and Standard, and similar jour- 
nals, 'it may be asked, whether there could not have been 
found room for occasional notices and recommendations of 
them, even if some of the discussions in the Liberator con- 
cerning the Sabbath and the Bible, and proceedings of con- 
ventions on those topics, had been somewhat curtailed or 
abridged. If it be so that even a condensed record of these 
movements (which were before them in their "exchange 
papers") would inconveniently encumber their columns, it 
would seem to follow that the sweeping charge against other 
anti-slavery bodies, of "having sprung into existence for the 
protection of pro-slavery churches," requires essential modifi- 
cation. For, with very inconsiderable exceptions, if any, 
these movements have been carried on by active members of 
the organizations thus censured. And no anti-slavery move- 
ments have been more bitterly assailed by the leaders and 
organs of the pro-slavery churches and missionary bodies. 

We now inquire, more particularly and directly, concerning 
the relation of the American Anti-Slavery Society to pro- 
slavery churches, and the efforts of its members in respect to 
anti-slavery church reformation. 

It may be true that a smaller proportion of the members of 



* The only exception we remember to have met with, was a favorable notice, in 
the National Anti-Slavery Standard, of the organization of a single local anti-slavery 
church, as though it were a new thing, some years after hundreds, probably, of 
similar churches had been organized, and after a change of editors of that paper. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. \A~ 

the American Anti-Slavery Society are connected with pro 
slavery churches, than arc to be found in the "new" organi- 
zation (or were in the Liberty party prior to 1848), because 
it may be true that a much smaller proportion of them (espe- 
cially leading members, editors, and lecturers) are, or desire 
to be, members of any organized churches whatever. 

If this be so, it may be remarked, that while abolitionists 
who rejected all church organization had an equal right to 
their own views and usages, it must be remembered that their 
separation from pro-slavery churches may have had other 
grounds than their abolition principles; and that it was com- 
paratively easy for those who, on such other grounds, had 
"come out" or remained out of the churches, to raise an out- 
cry against those who remained in them. This zeal may pos- 
sibly have sprung, in some measure, from another source 
besides their superior fidelity to the slave. It is not to be 
assumed that they were free from the common infirmities of 
human beings. Nor is it quite clear that they gave evidence 
of greater self-denial in the anti-slavery cause than did the 
man}' thousands (unrecognized as true abolitionists by thenv 
who, with strong attachments to long cherished church insti- 
tutions and loved associates, severed these strong ties, and 
with great sacrifices of social feeling and of pecuniary expen- 
diture, established new church relations, in accordance with 
anti-slavery principles, amid opposition and scorn. 

If large numbers of anti-slavery church members, particu- 
larly those called "orthodox" or "evangelical," separated 
from Mr. Garrison, and consequently from the American 
Anti-Slavery Society, on the division, some facts already 
stated may suggest reasons for their course, aside from the 
derelictions that have been imputed to them. Men seldom, ii 
ever, retain organized religious or moral co-operation and 
affinity with leaders Avho deride their religious principles and 
the institutions to which they have attached themselves. This 
may be accounted consistency and sagacity, or it may be 
accounted bigotry and weakness. The general fact, neverthe- 
less, remains. The cause existed, and was sufficient to pro- 

35 



0&6 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

duce the effect ; and there is no occasion, in the absence of 
evidence (with the exception of those favoring the " Clerical 
Appeal") to impute additional ones. It would be the extreme 
of bigotry, in such a case, to assume that their withdrawal from 
a particular anti-slavery society, and joining another one of 
the same anti-slavery creed, where their religious predilections 
would not be outraged, gave evidence of unfaithfulness to the 
anti-slavery cause. 

Similar causes, after the division, continued to produce and 
perpetuate similar effects. Conventions were held to discuss 
the Sabbath question. In March, 18-12, if we correctly 
remember, a Convention was held to discuss the divine inspi- 
ration and authority of the Bible. These Conventions were 
invited and attended by leading abolitionists in the American 
Anti-Slavery Society, and ground was taken by them, and 
language used, in those Conventions and in the columns of 
the Liberator, adverse to the principles of " orthodox" or 
" evangelical" Christians, and highly offensive to them. We 
say nothing here of the merits of these discussions. We say 
nothing against their right of free expression. We only 
record the facts along with the effect which they naturally 
and evidently produced — the alienation of many abolitionists 
from that Society, on other grounds than differences of anti- 
slavery principles, or even of anti-slavery measures — unless 
to " unseat popular theology from its throne" (in the language 
before quoted from the National Anti-Slavery Standard), and 
the overthrow of commonly accredited religious institutions, 
are to be recognized as anti-slavery measures. 

It was said that the Liberator, at that time, was not the 
official organ of the Society. But its editor was the recognized 
leader of the Societ}^. It was said that these conventions were 
not Anti-Slavery Conventions, and that the sentiments ob- 
jected against were not promulgated " on the Anti-Slavery 
platform," nor by " the Society as such."* But some feared 



* A certain Colonization Society, " as such," may not have forcibly expelled the 
colored people, nor enacted the Fugitive Slave bilL, nor advocated either of those 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 547 

thai the society would not be guided right, if its leaders 
refused to be guided by the Bible. 

Sometime after this, similar conventions were held in dif- 
ferent pails of the country, and as far west as Ohio, in this 
manner. Anti-slavery lecturers, agents of the Society, sus- 
tained by its funds, and holding the new views of civil gov- 
ernment, of penal law, of church institutions, of the ministry, 
of the Sabbath, and of the Bible, had their appointments for 
anti-slavery conventions published in their papers, before- 
hand, under the head of " One hundred Anti-Slavery Con- 
ventions." How many of them were held we do not know, 
but in several places where these appointments were fulfilled, 
the same speakers, by previous arrangement, would remain 
in the same place long enough to hold another convention on 
one or more of the other topics. Thus the funds of the Anti- 
Slavery Society appeared to have sustained the lecturers on 
the other topics, and the notices of anti-slavery conventions 
drew together hearers for them. If this was not the promul- 
gation of their other sentiments, "on the anti-slavery plat- 
form " and by "the society as such," it so nearly resembled 
it that many simple-minded people were so dull as to fail of 
perceiving the wide distinction. 

It will be seen from all this, that causes remote from pro- 
slavery and anti-slavery, withdrew many anti-slavery Church 
members from the Anti-Slavery Society conducted by Mr. 
Garrison and his associates — whether wisely or unwisely, on 
either side, is not the point to be here examined. We are 
recording the facts. 

And the facts being so, it might be inferred that this with- 
drawal of so many Church members from the American Anti- 
Slavery Society, (or this withholding them from joining it.) 
might possibly leave it in a position in which only a small 



measures " on the Colonization platform." Rut when those who hated those mea- 
sures found the leaders of the Colonization Society supporting them, they were led 
to identify them with the Colonization Society. We intimate no farther parallel in 
the cases than the natural workings of cause and effect on a community, when lead- 
ers in a great society give offense by their position. 



5±8 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN" 

proportion of its members, in comparison with those in the 
other society, would have any Church relations to be attended 
to, especially when it is remembered that some of the lending 
members neither held nor desired any such relations. 

It is evident that in any equitable comparison of the two 
societies, in respect to their course on the Church question, 
the comparison must be instituted between the ministers and 
Church members and their supporters, in the two societies. 

For some time after the division it was however claimed 
by the friends of Mr. Garrison that a considerable number of 
respectable orthodox ministers and Church members remained 
in their Society, whence they inferred that all genuine aboli- 
tionists among the "orthodox" would do so. We remember 
some prominent names of ministers and others who did re- 
main. And they also remained, so far as we know, in their 
old ecclesiastical connections, without being spurned by Mr. 
Garrison as " apostates." We never heard of their making 
any attempts at new Anti-Slavery Church organizations. If 
any of them did afterwards break off their connection from 
" pro-slavery Churches," it must have been, we think, by dis- 
carding all Church organizations. As for the rest, they stood 
in the same pro-slavery ecclesiastical relations with the mem- 
bers of the "New" organization, who were and still are 
denounced as untrue, for standing in precisely the same 
ecclesiastical relations. The historical evidence seems not 
quite clear that the one deserved a welcome place in " the 
only" true Anti-Slavery Society, while the other came justly 
under the condemnation of seeking " the protection of pro- 
slavery Churches." 

But, in addition to the "orthodox," there was probably a 
much greater number of ministers and Church members con- 
nected with the Old Society, who belonged to what are called 
" the liberal" denominations, as Universalists and Unitarians, 
to which we may add Swedenborgians, not to mention one 
branch of " the Friends." If to these we add numbers who, 
though not technically Church members, assisted in sustain- 
ing Churches, and ministers, and religious sects of some sort, 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. » 549 

we shall find, if wc mistake not, a large body of men con- 
nected with the American Anti-Slavery Society, who were, 
and still are, supporters of the different religious sects. Wc 
should not be surprised to be assured that they still constitute 
a considerable majority of the members of the Society. 

Except in the case of the "Friends," it will not probably 
be claimed that the sects just mentioned are more free from 
the imputation of being pro-slavery than the sects denomi- 
nated " evangelical " or " orthodox." As being more recent 
in their origin, they may have extended less into the slave 
States than some others. They may be, from the same cause, 
less easily controlled by their leaders. There is the less ex- 
cuse for their being pro-slavery, but, as sects, they nevertheless 
are so. Of few of their local congregations, perhaps, could 
it be said otherwise. As sects, (most commonly as local 
churches,) they have deprecated Anti-slavery agitation, de- 
nounced abolitionists, fostered prejudice against color, and 
by the votes of the majority of their members, maintained 
slavery at the ballot-box. This last item alone, according to 
Mr. Garrison, decides that they " do not deserve the name of 
abolitionists." Under this count, if not some of the others, 
we must reckon most of the "Friends." In the "Hicksite" 
connection, Charles Mariott and Isaac T. Hopper were " dis- 
owned" for their activity in Anti-slavery Societies. Yet 
abolitionists in the American Anti-Slavery Society continue 
in that religious connection. 

Now then, if the American and Foreign Anti-Slavery So- 
ciety deserves censure, for its support, through its member- 
ship, of pro-slavery Churches, the American Anti-Slavery 
Society, under the guidance and with the consent of Mr. 
Garrison, deserves the same censure, and for the same reason. 

If a majority of its members sustain the old existing sects 
and Churches — then a majority of them sustain pro-slavery 
Churches, and the position of the Society is thus defined. 

If, on the contrary, a majority of its members, including 
most of its leaders, support no churches at all, either pro-slavery 
or anti-slavery, most of them not desiring to support any, 



550 • GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

then their complaint against those who sustain pro-slavery 
Churches can have comparatively little weight, with those 
who understand their position in respect to all churches. 

Still farther, if a controlling majority of the Society (in 
either case).regard it regular and proper to receive and retain 
members who support pro-slavery Churches, then it is evident 
that no Anti-Slavery Society in the country has a lower 
standard of membership, so far as the Church question is con- 
cerned, than the American Anti-Slavery Society. 

And this is the fact of the case, as before shown. The So- 
ciety has no rule for excluding such members, and Mr. Garri- 
son says it ought to have none. Thus much for its exclusive 
claims. 

But the comparison invited by those claims may not end 
here. Among those charged with having separated from Mr. 
Garrison, and re-organized "for the protection of pro-slavery 
churches," we have witnessed a long protracted and widely 
extended anti-slavery church agitation, resulting in a series 
of secessions, and ecclesiastical and missionary re-organiza- 
tions, on an anti-slavery basis. It is natural and proper to 
inquire after similar manifestations among the members of 
" the only genuine anti-slavery society" that sets up such a 
high standard for its neighbors. 

And where shall we look for any such manifestations ? It 
has been seen that there has been, and still is, sufficient room 
and occasion for them. For the Society (on any estimate that 
can be made) contains not a few, ministers and others, con- 
nected with and sustaining pro-slavery church organizations. 

On some occasions we see names of ministers enrolled among 
the active friends and members of the Society. Some of them 
we know as earnest and long-tried laborers in the cause, and 
under that banner. We thank and honor them for their anti- 
slavery labors. But what are the ecclesiastical connections 
that they sustain ? To what churches are they ministering ? 
Is there one of them, or are there many of them, that can 
claim connection with an anti-slavery church? With a 
church that, at best, can be more favorably described than a 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 551 

church tolerating an anti-slavery minister and a few ami-sla- 
very members, who, on their part, agree to hold fellowship 
with pro-slavery members ? Are the "liberal" churches often 
in advance of this position? Is "the negro pew" an abomi- 
nation with them? 

We ask these questions without being able, with confidence, 
to answer them, or being able to specify an exception to the 
position indicated by them. There may be exceptions. We 
think there cannot be many. 

We have known of scores, and have heard of hundreds of 
ministers, who have conscientiously left their pro-slavery 
ecclesiastical connections to join or establish anti-slavery ones, 
or whose earnest anti-slavery preaching has driven them from 
their churches, or subjected them to persecutions from eccle- 
siastical bodies. Among all these we can recall to mind only 
two or three that w r e think may have been connected with 
the American Anti-Slavery Society since the division. It is 
to be presumed that there are others, but they are not proba- 
bly very numerous in the comparison with those not belong- 
ing to the Society.* 

There has been a division, in some form, among " Friends" 
in Indiana, on account of the slave question. A small seces- 
sion from Ilicksite Friends, perhaps partly on anti-slavery 
ground and partly for the enjoyment of local church inde- 
pendency, has taken place in Western New York. In both 
these movements there must have been members of the Amer- 
ican Anti-Slavery Society. These are the only instances we 
know of, with exception, perhaps, of a few individuals, belong- 
ing to that Society, who may have come into the general 
church secession movement, the Wesleyan, the Independent, or 
the Presbyterian, originated by and almost wholly composed of 



* Since writing the above paragraph, we have seen a statement of Rev. Theodoro 
Parker, of Boston, that " several Unitarian clergyman have been driven from their 
parishes in consequence of opposing'' " the Fugitive Slave bill." We think it very 
probable that some or all these may have been members of the American Anti- 
Slavery Society. There may be many other.-, of whom we have no knowledge. 



552 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

Liberty party men, and of those who held what are called 
" evangelical" views in theology. 

We have yet to hear of the first Convention among minis- 
ters and church members belonging to the " old" Society, to 
consider their pro-slavery church connections, and with a 
view to withdraw and re-organize, if a reformation could not 
be effected, or to form an Anti-Slavery Missionary Society. 

In attending more than a hundred such conventions, we 
have met very few known to us as members of the old So- 
ciety, or called Garrisonians. We can remember still fewer 
of them, if any, who seemed disposed to assist in gathering 
anti-slavery churches, or to favor anti-slavery missionary 
societies. 

These are negative statements. They are presented for 
want of information of a positive character. We can. tell less 
of what has been done, than of what (to our best knowledge) 
has not. The Liberator, the National Anti-Slavery Standard, 
and other journals of that class, and of the "liberal" sects, 
have not afforded us the information, as they should have 
done, if it were accounted important. 

It is in the same category that we must place the inquiry, 
How many, in the old Society, have "come out" from their 
old church organizations, without organizing new ones? We 
have no means of forming an estimate. But we suppose they 
can by no means equal the numbers of those in the other So- 
ciety and in the -Liberty party who have left pro-slavery 
churches and organized anti-slavery ones. If the class of 
abolitionists who repudiate all church organizations are not 
far more numerous than those who repudiate compulsory civil 
governments, their number cannot be great. And it is 
known that a very considerable number of those among this 
class of abolitionists, who reject such civil governments, are 
church members and pastors of churches. 

It is but proper and just to add, that if Garrisonian aboli- 
tionists who are church members, and who desire to sustain 
church relations, have not, to any extent, adopted the mea- 
sure of separation and re-organization, as such large numbers 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 553 

of other abolitionists have done, they have nevertheless their 
own way of agitating the subject, and no one questions their 
right to mark out their own course of operations, We have 
noticed the preceding facts merely to correct the erroneous 
statement that Garrisonian abolitionists are exclusively or pecu- 
liarly free from the inconsistency of supporting pro-slavery 
churches. Though we should be glad to see Garrisonian 
Universalists and Unitarians adopting the more stringent and 
radical measure of separation and re-organization, of which 
other abolitionists have set them an example ; yet we love to 
see them at work by voluntary associations of a denomina- 
tional character, calculated to have a beneficial influence upon 
their ecclesiastical associates. We record the following a 
men with much pleasure: 

" Boston, May 27, 1852. 

" At the session of the Universalist Moral Reform Society, to-day, com- 
posed in part of leading- Universalist ministers, the following resolution was 
offered, and after discussion adopted without opposition : 

" Resolved, That we view with deep concern the present attitude of our 
country on the subject of slavery, believing, as we do, that earnest efforts 
must be made for the overthrow of slavery, or the just judgment of God 
will descend on our land ; and seeing, with great pain, a disposition on the 
part of those called statesmen to patch up Compromises, which merely 
\hide, but cannot cure the evil, we feel called on, as Christians, to testify 
against the unrighteousness of slavery, and to request our fellow-Christians, 
of every sect, to unite with us in striving to break down that loathsome 
institution."— N. Y. Daily Tribune, May 28, 1852. 

Swedexborgians, or members of the " New Jerusalem 
Church," who are abolitionists, have done effective service in 
the cause, though we have not heard of any movements 
among them for severing religious connection from those of 
» the same faith at the South, who are slaveholders. And 
numbers of abolitionists of this sect, as among others before 
mentioned, belong to the American Anti-Slavery Society. 

From the preceding statements it must not be inferred that 
Mr. Garrison has regarded it consistent for the members of the 
American Anti-Slavery Society to continue their support of 
pro-slavery churches. They would learn otherwise from his 



554 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

general writings on the subject, as well as by his rebukes of 
the " new organization." What was " apostacy" and " hypo- 
crisy" in the one case, could not be less than " inconsistency" 
in the other, and as such it has been mildly censured. 

The " Society as such " — whatever may have been the po- 
sition of some of its officers and leading members — bore a 
similar testimony. Its resolutions and the speeches of its 
lecturers, were in conformity with the language of Mr. Garri- 
son. The question remains whether either the Society or Mr. 
Garrison were consistent or just in making so wide a distinc- 
tion between the supporters of pro-slavery churches in their 
own Society and those in other organizations — whether there 
has ever been, or now is, any proper foundation for their ex- 
clusive and extraordinary claims of being the only true and 
efficient Anti-Slavery Society, the only Society true on the 
Church question, while the other Society is to be spurned as 
" apostate" for its " protection of pro-slavery churches." With 
the preceding statements of facts before him, the reader will 
judge. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 555 



CHAPTER XLVII. 

GENERAL ESTIMATE OF THE AMERICAN" ANTI-SLAVERY SO- 
CIETY AND ITS LABORS, SINCE 1840. 

The Society an earnest and active organization against Slavery — Energy, talents, and 
perseverance of its leading members — On some points censured unjustly— No 
heresy in ['lacing Justice and Liberty above human "compacts" and the " Union" 
— Their orthodoxy to be distinguished from their heresy — Orthodox truth not to 
be abjured because promulgated by them — Pro-slavery Churches and Ministers 
responsible for their aberrations — An unfaithful church and ministry must reap the 
fruits of their unfaithfulness. 

Dismissing the history of "the only" true Anti-Slavery So- 
ciety in America, we will proceed to consider the American 
Anti-Slavery Society as an earnest and active organization 
against slavery. As such, the Society (apart from its connection 
with other topics, its exclusive claims, and its injustice to the 
Liberty party, and to the American and Foreign Anti-Slavery 
Society,) deserves honorable mention. Except in the instances 
and the particulars already recorded, and in which its exclu- 
siveness betrayed it into unworthy associations, or .its false 
theories withheld it from efficient political action, it has been 
doing good service to the cause of freedom. It has been one 
among several organized instrumentalities which Divine Provi- 
dence has been wielding against slavery. Its leading mem- 
bers have been persevering and untiring. They have ex- 
hibited a fixedness of purpose, and an energy of resolution 
that challenge admiration. With talents of a high order, and 
a hearty hatred of slavery, they have struck heavy blows 
which have taken effect, in despite of all their mistakes. Of 
William Lloyd Garrison it is needless to say much. As a 
writer, he will take a high rank among the strong men of the 



556 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

age. As a speaker, (though, less celebrated in that depart- 
ment) he has a simple, sober, solemn, straightforward earnest- 
ness that, with many minds, outweighs all charms of elocution 
and arts of rhetoric. Wendell Phillips is among the most 
accomplished orators of New England. Charles C. Burleigh 
is little behind him. In power and tact he may sometimes go 
beyond him. Edmund Quincy has a sharp pen and a ready 
tongue. When he is fortunate enough to direct his artillery 
against the enemies instead of the friends of the cause he 
loves, he is sure to do good execution. It would be pleasant 
to mention others, and to draw parallels between them and 
such men as Grerrit Smith, Beriah Green, Alvan Stewart, 
Myron Holly, Samuel E. Ward, William L. Chaplin, and 
others, of whose powers we might have spoken in our ac- 
count of the Liberty party — and Frederick Douglass and 
others who have made a trial of both platforms. But we 
must desist. Prominent abolitionists have been too much 
villified and too much praised. They have too much lauded 
and too much censured each other. Mutual flattery (so seem- 
ingly necessary in the ranks of the persecuted) erects hierar- 
chies, and these occasion schisms, and beget confusion of 
tongues. Divine Providence, in the meantime, vindicates its 
own claims to superintendency, and to the glory of every re- 
formatory achievement. 

On some points, respecting which Mr. Garrison has been 
much censured, even among earnest friends of freedom, we 
cannot, ourselves, join in the censure. 

Though he may have erred in swerving from our own "or- 
thodox" estimate of the divine inspiration of the Hebrew 
prophets, we cannot see that he has sinned against orthodoxy 
or the Bible, in repeating and in emulating the terrible de- 
nunciations of the Hebrew prophets and of Christ himself, 
against a priesthood that strikes hands with oppressors. 

Though (misled by the Federal Courts, the Federal Admin- 
istration, and the prevailing public sentiment,) he may have 
misinterpreted the Federal Constitution, as we think he has, 
we cannot say that he has erred in declaring such a constitu- 



SLAVERY AND FBEEDOM, f>57 

tion, as thus construed, in the strong language of scripture, "a 
covenant with death and an agreement with hell." We should 
feel that we were putting the Constitution^djovc the Bible, 
and above humanity, and above conscience, and above God, 
should we say otherwise. 

He may have efned in demanding, in unqualified terms, the 
immediate dissolution of the Union, as a means of abolishing 
slavery. It may be that the Union furnishes the best occa- 
sions of agitation, the best means of abolition, with a consti- 
tution rightly construed. It may be that our relations to the 
slave forbid our virtual desertion of him, by a dissolution of 
the Union. Here arc things to be considered — perhaps to be 
determined by coming events. 

So far as Mr. Garrison and his associates, and their Society, 
have contributed to bring this great problem before the people, 
so far as they have rebuked the servility that dares not "cal- 
culate the value of the Union" at a time when the Federal 
Administration declares the price to be the surrendry of free- 
dom ; so far as they have helped to expose the atheism that, 
in the name of religion, and from the pulpit, and by perver- 
sions of the Bible, has attempted to deify "the Union" in 
rivalry and in defiance of Jehovah, bidding us disobey Him 
bv obeying the Fugitive Slave Bill, (by which it is said the 
Union is to be preserved) so far they have deserved well of 
their country, have done service to the cause of freedom, and 
have vindicated the first principles of true religion. 

It is said that some of these men have become infidels. If 
it be so, under what influences have they become such ? If 
it be so, what is the proper cure of such infidelity? If it be 
so, shall we repudiate the truths they utter because they have 
uttered them ? Should a AVitherspoon withhold or blot his 
signature from the Declaration of "self-evident truths" be- 
cause penned by a Jefferson, or vindicated by a Paine ? Thai 
must be a sickly, purblind, faint-hearted, half-doubting " or- 
thodoxy," that fails to recognize or fears to honor the essen- 
tials of its own creed, on the lips of a heretic. Heresy lives 
upon its retained orthodox truths. It drives its most brisk 



558 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

and most lucrative business upon its capital of such truths, 
cast aside, forgotten, or unwisely relinquished to them, by the 
conservators of orthodoxy. The orthodox should learn to 
discriminate between the truths and the heresies of Mr. Gar- 
rison and his associates. There is no cause for alarm. Their 
orthodoxy will stand. Their heresy will # fall. The Bible is 
in no danger. The Sabbath, the Church, the Ministry, the 
ordinances of the gospel, and civil government, are in no 
danger. They will come brighter out of the ordeal. They 
will be better understood and more highly valued, though 
those who have perverted them may be less esteemed, and 
held mainly responsible for their temporary disrepute. 

When the Church and the Ministry — Heaven's own ap- 
pointed organizations for promoting human progress — lag 
behind the necessities of a progressive age: when they do 
worse than this, and throw themselves as blocks under the 
chariot wheels of the Messiah, they must, of necessity, reap the 
fruits of their unfaithfulness. The work of human redemp- 
tion, if " orthodoxy" be true, must go on, in despite of them, 
and, though it crushes them. The sublime truths of their 
creed, in their practical form and extended social applications, 
must find utterance. And " if these hold their peace, the stones 
of the street" shall find tongues for the task, and " shall cry 
out." We hold it altogether and distinctively "orthodox" 
to say this, and to add that " the eternal purpose of redeeming 
mercy" requires the chastisement, and, if not thus reclaimed, 
the removal of a church and ministry that cannot "open their 
mouths for the dumb." The true Church and the true minis- 
try, not yet extinct, (and already striking deep their roots) 
will survive. 

The same principle applies to abolitionists themselves. If 
untrue to their task, they must be displaced by a better 
instructed and more stable generation, who will come after 
them. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 559 



CHAPTEB XLVIII. 

REVIEW OF THESE DIVISIONS AND THEIR RESULTS. 

No body of abolitionists free from mistakes — Natural tendencies to division in an 
age of progress— Overruling Providence of God— Good resulting from evil — Ten- 
dency of the division to reach, with anti-Blavery truth, opposite classes— An anti- 
dote to the fear of centralized power — Democratic phase of development— No 
escape from abolitionism of some phase — Objection against anti-slavery " mtaawtP 
becoming obsolete — A sufficient variety of measures to accommodate all e 
men — The main question, now, a question of measures— This questiou r 
narrowing down— A great work to complete the enterprise, but an impossibility 
to undo what has been done — An indefinite amount of half-developed abolition 
ism needing guidance. 

In a review of the divisions among abolitionists, we may 
see much to rebuke human pride, and much to exalt the super- 
intending Providence of God — much to admonish, and much 
to inspire hope. 

No class or organization of abolitionists can claim exemp- 
tion from mistakes. None of them have been free from 
blemishes, inconsistencies and defects. To pretend it, would 
be to give evidence of partiality. If one of the societies has 
crippled itself by erratic progression — if the other has failed to 
make all the progress that the crisis demanded — if the Liberty 
party, except a handful, lost its hold upon its "one idea" by 
refusing to apply it in every direction, in the Church and in 
the State— if Liberty League men attempted a political organi- 
zation without the previous preparation and selection of mate- 
rials—if the Free Soil party sought strength and comprehen- 
siveness in numbers, rather than in a high tone of political 
ethics— there was nothing, in all this, out of the ordinary 
range of diversity, in times of revolution and progress. When- 
ever a mighty truth, vitalized and glowing, is thrown into a 



560 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

community, like a mass of melted metal into running water, 
the commotion tends to separate the disturbing force into 
shapeless fragments. But the principle of unity is not thus 
destroyed. The parts may afterwards come together and 
adhere. The unity of truth, will, in the end, be revealed. 

Under the good Providence of God, the dissensions among 
abolitionists, however humiliating to them, and however mis- 
chievous in some respects, have been over-ruled, in other 
respects, for good. Abolitionism, before the division, was a 
powerful elixir, in the phial of one anti-slavery organization, 
corked up tight, and carried about for exhibition. By the 
division, the phial was broken and the contents spilled over 
the whole surface of society, where it has been working as a 
leaven, ever since, till the mass is beginning to upheave. 

Had abolitionists remained in one compact and well defined 
body, with a uniform mode of action, the whole mass of the 
community might not have been as soon reached, and as tho- 
roughly permeated by them. A powerful and growing 
National Anti-Slavery Society, before the division, with its 
affiliated auxiliaries, and its central committee, was alreacly 
exciting jealousy against the cause. It was matter of fear 
among its friends. Dr. Channing was not alone nor singular 
in this feeling. It was more operative in the mass of the 
community than most abolitionists supposed. Had the Society 
remained united, and had its means and operations increased, 
this element of resistance would have soon made itself felt. 
By the division of the great National Society, and the conse- 
quent dwarfing of the two rival divisions, this central point 
of dreaded influence was rendered almost invisible. Divided 
farther and cut up by state, county, city, town, and village 
Committees, the work was going on, everywhere, without pre- 
senting an alarming concentration of power anywhere. The 
democratic principle in abolitionism underwent a democratic 
phase of development, and propagated itself as Christianity 
did, when the disciples, that were scattered abroad, went every- 
where, preaching the word. Yet the element of power, what- 
ever it might be, in the principle of episcopal supervision, had 



SI.AVKUY AND FREEDOM. 5G1 

its medium left, for those who chose to employ it, and they 
could look for this, to the centre of spiritual unity most con- 
genial to them. The division between Kome and Byzantium 
did not destroy Christianity or the Church. 

"With the rise of the distinct political party, there were 
manifested other phases of development. There was moral 
suasion abolitionism and political abolitionism. Then cam< 
also Church Eeform abolitionism — Missionary abolitionism - 
Methodist, Baptist, Congregational, Independent, and Presby- 
terian abolitionism. Politicians were careful to supply a 
Whig and a Democratic abolitionism. No man knew where to 
go to escape the infection. He could not elude it in the reli- 
gious sect, nor in the politieal party. If he cried out against 
abolitionism as " bigotry, priestcraft, and Puritanism," behold 1 
there was the most rampant abolitionism, at his elbow, railing 
lustily against "bigotry, priestcraft, Puritanism, and pro- 
slaveryism" — placing them all in a row. If one sought, in 
view of this, to disparage abolitionism as heretical and infidel, 
behold ! the gathering of an anti-slavery conference and prayer 
meeting met his vision, and on his ears came quotations from 
Tsaiah, and Hopkins, and Wesley, and Edwards. The sim- 
pleton who had but just learned from his political editor to 
curse the abolitionists, was puzzled to find the same editor, or 
perhaps his Congressional candidate, professing to be as good 
an abolitionist as anybody. 

And when earnest and even acrimonious debates among 
abolitionists themselves, arrested the attention of the corarau- 
nitv, displacing the controversy between abolitionists and 
•their opposers, a remarkable effect was produced. Thousands 
now heard or read them for the first time. The issue before 
the public mind was soon changed. The question was not 
whether slavery ongld to be abolished, nor ichen it should 
t> e — but, by what methods and motives should the people be 
brought up to the work. The previous question was taken 
for granted, as not needing debate. A community could not 
long listen to able debates on such a question without uncon- 
sciously sliding into the idea that, in some way, the work was 
• ' 36 



562 GREAT STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

to be done. The a duty and safety of immediate and uncondi- 
tional emancipation " had been settled, among intelligent men, 
by " the West India experiment." 

With all the varied modes of proposed and attempted anti- 
slavery agitation and action, arising out of these divisions and 
discussions, another objection against abolitionists has become 
obsolete — "We do not approve of your measures!" — " Which 
of them? " might be the inquiry in return. It might be dif- 
ficult to conceive of any measure, which some class of pro- 
fessed abolitionists have not proposed. And no small progress 
has been made towards a disposal of the rival claims thus 
presented. 

It may be a great work to carry the enterprise forward to 
its consummation. But it would be a more difficult, nay, an 
impossible task, to carry it back to where it stood twenty 
years ago. There is an indefinite amount of latent, half- 
developed, incipient abolitionism, in the country, needing 
guidance, that is not now embraced under any existing or- 
ganization. It seems waiting for the solution of a few 
remaining problems, of which we shall treat in the next 
chapter. 



SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. "03 



CHAPTES XLIX. 

DIFFERENT VIEWS OF THE O 'NSTITl'TION, AND OF TEE 
LEGALITY OF SLAVERY. 

Vital importance of the questions — Alternatives presented by them — Almost tho 
only questions remaining to be settled — All public business involving the Slave 
question must be transacted on some theory of the Constitution, and of the legality 
of slavery — All anti-slavery action must assume some theory — Three General Views 
of the Constitution — 1. The ultra Southern or Calhoun theory — 2. The prevalent 
theory of the "Compromises" — 3. The construction in favor of Liberty — Previous 
question of the legality of slavery — References to the preceding history— Princi- 
ples of interpretation — Features of the Constitution — Comparison of the three 
theories — Results. 

The relation of the Federal Constitution to slavery must 
have an important bearing on the Slavery Question in America. 

"Whether an oath to support the Constitution be an oath to 
support slavery, is only one of the many important questions 
involved in it. 

If the Constitution requires us to support slavery, then the 
Constitution requires us to overthrow our own liberties, to 
declare war against universal humanity, to rebel against God,' 
and incur his displeasure. 

If the Constitution does this, it is to be either amended, or 
overthrown. Otherwise, we must submit to be slaves to one 
portion of our fellow-men, while assisting to make slaves of 
another portion of them — we must throw off our allegiance 
to God, for the sake of maintaining allegiance to the deadly 
enemy of ourselves, our country, and our race. 

But if the Constitution be in favor of liberty and against 
slavery, then it is our duty and interest to wield it for the 
overthrow of slavery and the redemption of our country from 
the heel of the slave power. 



664 THE SLAVERY QUESTION 

In the one case, our line of march out of Egyptian bondage 
lies through the bloody sea of Eevolution — in the other, 
through the legitimate action of our government, as already 
organized. 

In the progress of the slave question we have now arrived 
at that point at which the legality and the constitutionality 
of slavery are among the very few questions that remain to 
be settled. 

The inherent criminality of slavery and of slaveholding, 
their utter repugnance to natural justice, to Christianity, to 
the law of nature, to the law of God, to the principles of de- 
mocracy, to the liberties of the country — no longer present 
questions for serious discussion among the great body of 
intelligent citizens in the non-slaveholding States. Here and 
there a superannuated ecclesiastic (who has, perhaps, a son at 
the South, or in a college seeking southern patronage) may 
thumb over his Polyglot, and pretend to find a justification 
of slavery. But nobody believes him. His disclaimers and 
self-contradictions prove that he does not — even in his dotage 
— believe it himself! His friends shield him from the im- 
pending avalanche of public scorn, by saj-ing — " Do let him 
alone — he can do no mischief — he is not worth minding !" 

The settlement of this question has disposed of nearly all 
the one hundred and one objections that, fifteen years ago, 
were confidently urged against the doctrines and measures of 
abolitionists. In most circles, it would be difficult to broach 
them without being voted a bore. 

Almost the only remaining exceptions are those that clus- 
ter around the supposed "guaranties" or "compromises of 
the Constitution"- — the "legal rights" — the " vested immuni- 
ties" of the slaveholder. Take away these,, and what is 
there left? 

The Church question, as well as the political question,, as it 
lies in many minds, hinges just here. The Church must not 
speak against Cassar — must be in subjection to " the powers 
that be" — and that, too, without stopping to inquire whether 
they be, or be not! It may be said that the Church — with her 



IN THE UNITED STATES. 505 

Bible in her hand — should be able to shape her course, with- 
out asking leave of the Federal Constitution. So she should. 
And in so doing, she should throw out principles before the 
world that would help us to definitions of " law " and " 1 
rights " — and enable us to expound Constitutions correctly, in 
the light of UNIVERSAL law. 

It is difficult to dispose of any public business in Congress, 
without involving the slave question, and this involves at 
once the question whether the Constitution sust: ins slavery — 
whether the slaveholder has a legal right to the slave. 

If there is to be any political action against Slavery, under 
the .Federal Constitution, we must know what the Constitu- 
tion authorizes us to do in the premises. If it "guaranties" 
Slavery, then it forbids us to do any thing. If it has " com- 
promises," they limit our action, and wc must know their 
extent. The questions between Liberty Party (as it was) Free 
Soil Party, Liberty League or present Liberty Party, turn, 
very much, on the Constitutional question. 

If the Federal Judiciary is to be used, either as a weapon 
of assault upon the Slave Power, or as a shield of defense 
against its attacks, the relation of the Federal Constitution 
to Slavery and the legality of Slavery become the main points 
at issue before the Courts. 

In every view of the task before us, the assumed legality 
and constitutionality of Slavery thrust themselves directly 
across our path, and come under our eye. It is one cheering 
sign that we have traveled nearly the whole distance from 
our starting-place to the citadel, when so many familiar ob- 
jects and once formidable obstacles are distanced, and only 
two or three remain to be grappled with. — Overcome these, 
and the work is accomplished. 

The various views of the Constitution may perhaps be 
classified under three general heads : 

First, the idea that slavery, as a lawful and legitimate 
interest, in common with other rightful and legitimate inter- 
ests, is entitled to the protection of the Federal Government, 
and that it was established for that end. 



566 THE SLAVERY QUESTION 

Second, the idea that, although slavery is not a rightful 
and legitimate interest, its existence is nevertheless tolerated, 
and the Government restricted from abolishing it. 

Third, the idea that slavery is an usurpation, an abuse from 
the beginning, that it has never been legalized, that the Consti- 
tution has not legalized it, that consequently it remains illegal, 
and that it is the duty of the Federal Government (as well as 
of the State Governments), in all its branches (legislative, 
judicial, and executive) to treat it as illegal, and repress it, as 
any other crime or treason against the essential rights of the 
people is to be repressed. 

The limits of the present work will not allow of extended 
statements of the arguments upon which these conflicting 
theories are based. The most we can attempt is to give such 
a view of them as may enable the reader to see what they are, 
that he may examine them at his leisure. 

I. The theory first mentioned is the generally prevalent 
one at the South. With the more ultra (the Calhoun or Caro- 
linian school) it would seem that slavery is considered not 
only a legitimate interest, but the leading, the paramount one, 
to which all other interests are to give way. The mildest, the 
most modified form in which this theory is held (or which is 
now represented by the Southern delegation in Congress), is 
that of the border States, and is expounded by Henry Clay. 
It may indeed talk of " compromises," but by Mr. Clay's own 
showing, they give everything to slavery, and nothing to 
freedom. The Fugitive Slave bill, defended by Mr. Clay, 
consists with the mildest type of this theory. 

This theory must repose, for its basis, either upon the idea 
of Calhoun, McDufne, Dew, &c, that slavery is originally and 
abstractly right, and that it presents the best state of society ; 
or else upon the idea of Mr. Clay, that " what the law makes 
property is property" — and that " two hundred years of negro 
slavery have sanctioned and sanctified" the principle of pro- 
perty in man. To complete the argument, it must be shown 
either that the Constitution affirms the original right of 
slavery, or the principle that involves it; or that it sanctions 



IN TIIE UNITED STATES. 567 

and ratifies the process of its previous legality, as described 
by Mr. Clay. 

II. The second theory of the Constitution, that of a "com- 
promise" between slavery and freedom, is so vague and 
unsettled, and is exhibited in such a variety of shades, that it 
is difficult to exhibit it with much accuracy or order. The 
field is wide enough to accommodate Daniel Webster and 
Moses Stuart, on the one hand, shaking hands with Henry 
Clay over the Fugitive Slave bill ; and the leaders of the 
Free Soil party, on the other, intent on " divorcing the Fede- 
ral Government from the support of slavcrv." However wide 
the chasm between these opposing parties may be, they occupy 
the common platform of the supposed " compromises of the 
Constitution," which have never been satisfactorily agreed 
upon among those who recognize them. 

Whether the alleged "guaranties" of slavery should be 
assigned a place under this theory or the preceding one, may 
seem, at first view, uncertain. Perhaps they belong to both. 
The "compromises," as Mr. Webster understands them, 
involve a pretty strong " guaranty." And the compromises 
of those who would only "divorce the Federal Government 
from the support of slavery," would seem to involve a gua- 
ranty that — within a certain enclosure, however bounded — 
slavery should not be disturbed. It is not known to the 
writer that any of the friends of liberty who admit the doc- 
trine of the " compromises," and who yet adhere to the Con- 
stitution, would do otherwise than " guaranty" to the slave- 
holder the right of seizing his fugitive slave in the free Stales, 
provided that, by jury trial and other safeguards, due security 
be given that none except fugitives from slavery be given up. 
This is a " guaranty" that introduces slavery, in one of its 
most odious features, into the free States themselves. Being- 
done by the conceded structure of the Federal Government, 
and assented to by the free States, it seems not to consist with 
the idea of divorcing either the State or Federal Government 
from slavery. The magnitude of this " guaranty" is seen in 
the contrast between the position of the Canadas, where the 



568 THE SLAVERY QUESTION 

fugitive is safe, and that of a non-slaveholding State of this 
Union, permitting, under any modifications, the re-capture of 
a fugitive from slavery. 

Southern statesmen, of the school of Mr. Clay, understand 
" the compromises of the Constitution" to involve ample 
" guaranties." Those of the ultra Southern school, have some- 
times, we believe, disclaimed the proper idea of " guaranties," 
because they conceived that it might involve the principle 
that the right of slaveholding was held under the Federal 
Constitution, instead of the original and absolute State sover- 
eignty claimed by them. They hold the Federal Government 
to be the servant and instrument of the slave power, rather 
than its conservator and patron. 

The most that any of the friends of freedom, admitting 
: ' the compromises" and yet adhering to the Constitution, 
could claim under their theory, would perhaps be included in 
the following- ; 

1. The rightful power of Congress to abolish slavery in the 
Federal District and Territories, including the idea that it is 
unconstitutional in the Federal District. 

2. The right to prevent the extension of slavery into new 
territories, and to refuse the admission of new slave States. 

3. The right to abolish the slave trade between the States, 
coastwise and inland. 

4. The right of the free States to insist on the jury trial 
and other securities, to prevent others than fugitives from 
slavery from being seized and carried back as slaves. 

5. The restriction of the right to reclaim fugitives to the 
citizens of the original thirteen States now permitting slaverj r , 
to the exclusion of the right of citizens of the Federal Dis- 
trict, Territories, and States, admitted since the adoption of 
the present Constitution. 

6. The right to refuse recognizing the legality of slavery in 
Louisiana and Florida where, by the terms of the Treaty of 
Cession, the "inhabitants" were to be received as " citizens of 'the 
United States" 

7. The right of the Federal Government to decline the use 



IX THE DOTTED st.vit.s. 5G9 

of its diplomacy, and other powers, in sustaining directly or 
indirectly the institution of slavery, except in the case of rap 
pressing a servile insurrection — another "guaranty"' include d 
in the theory of "compromise" — if we rightly underst 
that theory. 

We are not aware that any abolitionists conceding the 
•'compromises of the Constitution" — yet adhering to their 
allegiance to it — have claimed anything more under it than 
this. 

This leaves to the several slave states the right of main- 
taining .slavery as long as they please, and yet remaining in 
the Union, with the right, under modifications, of making the 
free states their hunting-ground for fugitives. 

It concedes the duty of the Federal Government and the 
free states under the Constitution, to assist in putting down 
insurrections of slaves. 

" The Almighty has no attributes," says Mr. Jefferson, 
"that could take sides with us in such a contest." Those 
who construe the Constitution as including such "compro- 
mises" and "guaranties," and who nevertheless cling to 'the 
Constitution and cry out against anti-slavery disunionists, 
would do well to "count the cost" of such a contest, which 
seems to be hastening, and ask themselves whether their 
forces are sufficient for the emergency, and whether it be 
quite safe and prudent to occupy their present position. Is it 
consistent for abolitionists — is it right or wise for the non- 
slaveholding states to adhere to the "Union" and to the 
"Constitution" as thus construed? 

III. We come to consider the construction of the Constitu- 
tion that acknowledges none of these compromises and guar- 
anties. 

' This construction is connected with another idea lying back 
of it, of the illegality of slavery before the Constitution was 
formed. 

It is not commonly supposed that the Constitution originated 
legal slavery, or gave to it a validity that it did not possess 



570 THE SLAVERY QUESTIOX 

before. The two theories already described, do not include 
such an idea. The most ultra of the Southern expositors of 
the Constitution would most indignantly spurn it. And the 
theory of "compromises" supposes something already existing 
to be the subject of the compromise. 

If there was no legal slavery to be compromised or guaran- 
tied, then the Constitution, however constructed or designed, 
must have failed to effect any such purpose. Had the docu- 
ment recognized a certain river as a Western boundary, which 
was afterwards found to be only an imaginary one, so much 
of the instrument must have become obsolete and inoperative 
of course. Just so of any supposed State laws or institutions 
which should afterwards be found to have had no valid ex- 
istence.* 

The very first question, then, (as some contend) is, whether 
there was any legal slavery in the States when the Constitu- 
tion was formed. The fact of existing slavery is not to be 
confounded with its legality. The fact may have been only 
an usurpation, an abuse, a crime. The fact of slavery existed 
a long time in England, and the courts held it to be legal. 
But it was afterwards ascertained and decided that it never 
had been.f 

It has lately come to light that leading lawyers and states- 
men at the South are apprehensive that their slavery is not 
legal — that they are unwilling to have its legality tested in 
the courts — that this is the ground of their objection to a 
jury trial for fugitives — and that the Senate of the United 
States, participating in the same apprehensions, has shaped its 
legislation accordingly.^: 



* This principle is thus recognized by the Supreme Court of the United States. 
" A legislative act, founded upon a mistaken opinion of what was law, does not 
change the actual state of the law, as to pre-existing cases." — 1 Granch 1, Peters' 
Digest, 578. 

t See Chapter VI. 

\ In the recent debate in the U. S. Senate, on the Fugitive Slave bill, Mr. Mason, 
of Virginia, objected to the amendment of Mr. Dayton, providing for a jury trial, 
because, said he : 

" A trial by jury necessarily carries with it a trial of the icltole rigid, and A TKI AL 



IN THE UNITED STATES. 571 

If slavery was legal at the time when the Federal Consti- 
tution was adopted, when did it become so? When, how, 
where, and by whom, was it legalized? 

It will not be said, except by the ultra slave party, that the 
right to hold slaves is a natural right, the same as the right 
to own oxen. If it were a natural right, then it would be in- 
herent in all men, black and white, slaves and slaveholders. 
The confusion consequent on this assumption, sets it aside. 

The best writers on common law afiirm that slavery is so 
evidently contrary to the paramount law of nature, to justice, 
to fundamental morality, and the law of God, that it never 



OF THE KIGIIT TO SERVICE will he gone into, according to alt the forms of the 
Court, in determining upon an;/ other feet." 

And where would bo the hardship of this ? Why should not the investigation take 
place ? Mr. Mason had told the Senate why. 

'• Then, again, it is proposed, as a part of the proof to be adduced at the hearing, 
after the fugitive has been re-captured, that evidence shall be brought by the claimant 
to show thai slavery is established in the State from which thefvgit 
Now this very thing, in a recent case in the city of New York, was required by one 
of the judges of that State, which case attracted the attention of the authorities of 
Maryland, and against which they protested," <te. "In that case the State judge 
went so far as to say that the only mode of proving it was by reference to the Statute 
book. Such proof is required in the senator's amendment ; and if he means by this 
that proof sliall be brought that slavery is established by existing laics, it is imp < 

to comply ivith the requisition, FOE NO SUCH LAW CAN BE PRODUCED, I 
apprehend, i.v any of tile slave States. I am not aware that there is A SINGLE 
STATE in -which the institution is established by positive law. On a former occa- 
sion, and on a different topic, it was my duty to attempt to show to the Senate that 
no such law was necessary for its establishment; CERTAINLY NONE COULD BE 
FOUND, and none was required in any of the States of the Union." — Lit" 
Sept. 6, 1850, copied from the Washington Union. 

The pretense set up by Mr. Mason, that slavery can exist under common law, 
•without positive law, is contradicted by numerous legal authorities and decisions. 
Once, at least, in Louisiana, it was decided that a slave carried to Europe by his 
master, and returned, was free, because he had been carried out of the jurisdiction 
of the local laws of Louisiana. 

Mr. Mason enlarged on the topic, and said distinctly that he was not willing to 
trust the question with the Courts in the free States. The Senate evidently partook 
of his apprehensions. They struck out Mr. Dayton's amendment, lest it should be 
decided by the Courts that there was no legal slavery in, the Southern States. Hence, 
also, the peculiar structure of the infamous Fugitive Slave bill, allowing no litigation, 
no counter evidence, no habeas corpus, no " due process of law." If slavery were 
believed by the slaveholders to be legal, would they fear to have the question litigated 
in the Courts ? 



572 THE SLAVERY QUESTION 

was, and never can be, legalized ; and that no legislature nor 
monarch possesses the power to make it legal. 

But, not to insist on this, and coming down to the lowest 
possible standard of legality that can be made intelligible, 
that of positive enactment, we inquire — When was American 
slavery made legal, and by whom ? 

Was it legalized by the permit of Queen Elizabeth to John 
Hawkins to import negroes with their own free consent? By 
the laws regulating the trade to Africa, but forbidding the 
forcible or fraudulent exportation of the natives? 

Was it legalized by the British Constitution? By the com- 
mon law of England ? By the Colonial Charters which re- 
stricted colonial legislation to a conformity with English com- 
mon law ? The very reverse of all this was the fact. 

Was it legalized by the acts of the colonial legislatures in 
direct opposition to the Colonial Charters ? Or, are there any 
such enactments (whether authorized by the Colonial Charters 
or otherwise) creating the relation of slavery? If neither 
Mr. Mason nor Mr. Bayly could find any, — and if the whole 
course of southern argument concerning slavery in Mexico, 
unites in the testimony that there are none — ma}* - we not 
pretty confidently conclude that none exist?* 

Does not the decision of Lord Mansfield, in the Somerset 
case, (in 1772,) as clearly prove that there was, then, no legal 
slavery in these Colonies as that there was none in En°;land ? 



' * During the long debates of 1850, in Congress, it was abundantly insisted by Mr. 
Bayly, Mr. Mason and others, that slaves might now be held legally in the territory 
conquered from Mexico, though there were no positive enactments there creating 
the relation. And in proof they urged the fact that slavery existed in our own slave 
States without any such enactments. The lame link of the logic was the monstrous 
assumption that slavery can legally exist ivlthovt positive law, that is, on the foun- 
dation of natural right ! After his return home to Virginia, Mr. Bayly addressed a 
circular to his constituents repeating the argument, in which he said : 

" We all know that slavery was introduced into the British Colonies of America 
ix absence of a statute, and solely under the protection of the Comnwn law! n 

How the " Common law" protects slavery may be seen in the decision of Lord 
Mansfield in the case of Somerset. But these Southern testimonies to the fact that 
slavery in America was introduced in the absence of any statute creating it, may be 
considered conclusive on that point, and so of the whole question. 



IN THE UNITED STATES. 573 

If, as he decided, slavery could not legally exist in I 
without positive enactment, how could it exist ;n these Colo- 
nies, under the same jurisdiction, and the same common law, 
without positive enactment? 

Was Slavery legalized by the Declaration of American In- 
dependence, proclaiming that "all men arc created equal ?" 
On the contrary, if there had been any l<"j;il slavery then 
existing in the Colonics, would not that unanimous Declara- 
tion of the Colonies have abolished it? 

Was Slavery legalized by the /St"\ Constitutions that were 
framed soon after the Declaration of Independence, and re- 
peating the same " self-evident truths " — in Maryland and 
oilier Southern States — the same as in Massachusetts, where 
the Courts decided that the Declaration had abolished Sla- 
very? " Not one of them recognized Slavery" nor was there, 
in one of them, any authority conferred on the legislature to 
enslave any body. 

Was Slavery legalized by the Articles of Confederation, 
that made no manner of allusion to it? 

If Slaver}' was not legalized, at that time, how has it be- 
come legal, since? 

And if not legal, how can it have become Constitutional? 
Can it be Constitutional while it is illegal ? 

The Constitution must either receive a strict literal con- 
struction, or else it must be construed by the living spirit that 
pervades the instrument — its main design, its grand leading 
object. 

If construed strictly and literally, what becomes of its 
"compromises" and "guaranties?" What does it say of 
" slavery " — of " slaves " — or of " property in man ?" What 
could be made, even of the clause concerning " persons held 
to service and labor," from whom service is " due ?" Is there 
any proper description of a slave in this clause? Can any 
thing be " due " from one who cannot even make a contract ? 
The laws of the Slave States do not admit that a slave is " a 
person." How then can a " person held to service and labor" 
be a slave ? 



574 THE SLAVEEY QUESTION 

" Where rights are infringed, where fundamental principles are over- 
thrown, where the general system of laws is departed from, the legislative 
intention must be expressed with irresistible clearness to induce a Court 
of Justice to suppose a design to effect such objects." — Rule of Supreme 
Court of U. S., case United States vs. Fisher and others. 2 Cranch, 390. 

The "intentions of the framers" (on this principle of strict 
construction) is to be gathered only by their words, strictly 
construed. Besides, " the framers," as they are called, did not 
make the Constitution. They only proposed it. They sat with 
closed doors, and the people knew their intentions only by 
their words. It was the people, and not the Convention, that 
formed the Constitution, when they ratified it.* 

If, departing from this "strict construction," we take the 
spirit, grand design, scope, aim, and object, of the Constitu- 
tion, then we are driven to the Preamble, to the Declaration 
of Independence, and to the literature of the times, the writ- 
ings of Jefferson, the doings of Franklin, the Ordinance of 
1787, &c, for a rule of interpretation. How much the claims 
of legal and Constitutional Slavery would gain by this pro- 
cess, the reader of the preceding history can inquire at his 
leisure. 

The Declaration of Independence, by-the-by, has never 
been repealed. It was, for years, the only Constitutional law 
of the United States, and it is no less Constitutional law now, 
than formerly. Can there be either legal or Constitutional 
Slavery under such an organic law? Were the Courts in 
Massachusetts mistaken, when they decided otherwise ? 

" The first act of our nation (the Declaration of Independence) being a 
solemn recognition of the liberty and equality of all men, and that the 
rights of liberty and happiness are inalienable — was the corner-stone of our 
Confederacy, and is above all Constitutions and all laws." — John C. 
Spencer. 

" The United States shall guaranty to every State in the Union a repub- 
lican form of government." — Constitution, Art. IV., Sect. 4. 

This is the only " guaranty " in the Constitution. 



* The language of the Constitution shows this— "We, the people of the United 
States," " do ordain," &c. 



IN' THE DOTTED STATES. 57fi 

And what is a republican form of government? 

" The true foundation of republican government is the equal righl 
every citizen in his person and property, and in their managi ment. — 
Jefferson. 

Mr. Jefferson repeatedly speaks of the slaves as "citizens." 
— Vide Notes on Virginia. 

"No State shall pass any bill of attainder," or " laws impairing tin- 
obligation of contracts," or "grant any title of nobility." The citizens 
of each State shall be entitled to all the privileges and immunities of citi- 
zens in the several States." 

IIow can Slavery in the States consist with all these prohi- 
bitions, describing its essential arrangements ? 

Does Congress possess the powers requisite to enforce all 
such salutary restrictions upon the States ? 

" Congress shall have power to make all laws which shall be necessary 
and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other 
powers vested by this Constitution in the government of the United States, 
or in any department or officer thereof." — Art. 1, Sec. 8, Clause 17. 

*' This Constitution, and the laws of the United States which shall be 
made in pursuance thereof, and all treaties made, or which shall be made, 
under authority of the United States, shall be the supreme law of the 
land, and the judges in every State shall be bound thereby, anything in 
the Constitution or laws of any State to the contrary notwith- 
standing." — Art, VI., 2. 

If this be not sufficient to make the Constitution, as origi- 
nally framed and adopted, an Anti-slavery document, there is 
an amendment, afterwards added, which seems sufficiently 
decisive. Let it be borne in mind that an amendment to a 
Constitution, like a codicil to a will, overrules, controls, and 
annuls whatever in the original instrument is inconsistent 
with it. 

'• No person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due 
process of law." — Amendments V. 

" Due process of law" includes an indictment, trial by jury, 



576 THE SLAVERY QUESTION 

and judgment rendered in open court."" What slave has ever 
been " deprived of liberty " in this manner ? 

Admitting that the original Constitution contained all the 
" compromises and guaranties " ever attributed to it, does not 
this 'amendment sweep them all away by prohibiting Slavery ? 

Slaves are either citizens of the United States or they are 
aliens. If citizens, they are entitled to the rights and privi- 
leges of citizens, and these are incompatible with slavery. But 
if they are aliens, then Congress, under the Constitution, has 
the power, by naturalization, to make them citizens of the 
United States. 

" Congress shall have power to establish a uniform system of naturaliza- 
tion." — Constitution, Art. I. Sec. 3, Clause 4. 

If the States may reduce to slaver}* the citizens of the Uni- 



* Judge Story, in his Commentaries upon the Constitution of the United States, 
speaking of this provision of the instrument, says : 

" The other part of the clause is but an enlargement of the language of Magna 
Charta, ' nee super eum ibimus, nee super eitm mittimus, nisi per legale judicium pari- 
tt?)i suorum vel per legem terra" 1 — neither will ive pass upon. Mm or condemn him, but oy 
the lawful judgment of his peers, or by the laiv of the land. Lord Coke says that the 
latter words, 'per legem terrce,' 1 (by the law of the land,) mean ' by due process of 
law,' that is, due presentment or indictment, and being brought in, to answer thereto 
by ' due process of law.' So that this clause, in effect, affirms the rigiit of trial, 
according to process and proceedings of Common law." 

It has, however, been alleged that " Due process of law is process sanctioned by 
law : as when a juror is fined by the Court for non-attendance, a spectator impris- 
oned for contempt, land and money taken by tax-gatherers and assessors, and a 
soldier shot by order of a court martial.' 1 '' 

It may be answered that customs and usages do not define or create law, but 
should be controlled by it. Convenience, in small matters, or where gross injustice 
is seldom perpetrated, may tolerate customs not strictly legal. More than this : 
Cross outrages, in open defiance of Magna Charta and Common law, have been con- 
tinued through entire generations. Thus, in England, the practice of home impress- 
ment of merchant seamen for the Eoyal Navy — is an admitted violation of English 
law. Martial law supersedes Civil law, and hence the latter cannot be defined by 
the former. The Turkish Sultan's order to behead any subject in his dominions may- 
be " sanctioned by law," and the same Congress and President that enacted the 
Fugitive Slave bill might have conferred upon the President the prerogatives of the 
Turkish Sultan, with as much reason, or equal legality. The people insisted upon 
this provision in " Amendment V." for the purpose of securing themselves against 
such agressions. But the precaution would avail them nothing, if the inhibition is 
to be construed in conformity with usages, instead of bringing usages to the test of 
inhibitions. If this Amendment cannot protect us from slavery, what can it protect 
us from ? Or, of what use is it 1 



IX THE UNITED STATES. 577 

ted States, then they may abolish the Federal Government, by 

depriving it of citizens. If a State may reduce one man, un- 
der its jurisdiction, to slavery, it may reduce all men, undei 
its jurisdiction, to slavery, and thus nullify the Federal Gov- 
ernment, so far as the State is concerned. 

The organization of the Militia, of the Postoffice, and Mail. 
and Custom-house establishments, pertain, under the Constitu- 
tion, to the Federal Government, in its various departments. 
In these, as in all other Federal appointments, no restriction 
is imposed, as to the persons to be organized, appointed, or em- 
ployed. If the States, by their legislation, (or if the citizens of 
the States, sustained by State authority,) may designate the per- 
sons whom the Federal Government may not organize as mili- 
tia, nor employ in the Custom-house, Postoffice, and Mail 
establishments, or appoint to other offices, then the States, (or 
citim ns of the States) may cripple if not abrogate the power and 
action of the National Government, in all these departments I 
If they may withdraw one-fourth or one-half of the people from 
their allegiance and subjection to the Federal Government, 
and from their liability or capacity for military or other ser- 
vices under it, then they can withdraw three-fourths, nine- 
tenths, or ninety-nine one-hundredths, in the same manner, and 
thus overthrow the national government- in those States. 

Such is an outline of the theory that denies the "com- 
promises and guaranties of the Constitution" in favor of 
slavery. 

Those who hold this view, believe that every slave in the 
United States is entitled to the privileges of the writ of habeas 
corpus, and to the benefits of a judicial decision in favor of his 
freedom. And they believe that Congress and the Federal 



* In many of the slave States the militia is of no value to the Federal Govern- 
ment from this cause, and is scarcely sufficient to keep//.- ilaeeslxx subjection in 
time of peace ! lias the Federal Government no remedy for this ? John Quuioy 
Adams declared a truth in Congress when he said that " the war power of Cougrsss" 
was adequate to the abolition of slavery. But is this the while of the truth? If 
Congress lias any "war power," may it not put the country in a state of prepantidii 
for defense ? 



578 THE SLAVEKY QUESTION 

Executive arc bound to provide a judiciary that will discharge 
its duty, and to protect, (if need be) the Courts, in the efficient 
exercise of their functions. 



COMPARISON OF THESE THREE THEORIES. 

The first of these three theories of the Constitution seems to 
present the friends of freedom with no alternatives but sub- 
jection or revolution. 

It is too late in the day to dream of liberty for a portion of 
a people, while another portion of them are enslaved. 

Whatever may be said of " moral suasion," it cannot be 
expected that slavery will soon cease in this country, by vol- 
untary emancipation, on the part of all the slaveholders, or by 
the great body of them, while they are upheld by the action 
of legislative and judicial authorities. 

Nor can it be thought probable that the authorities of the 
Slave States will voluntarily change their position, in advance 
of their constituents, or while the Federal Government main- 
tains (as at present) a position very nearly in accordance with 
the constitutional exposition now under review. 

It is equally evident that the friends of liberty, so far as 
they shall receive this exposition of the Constitution as the 
correct one, can have no hope of any political remedy short 
of disunion or revolution. 

Nor does it seem clear that a dissolution of the Union be- 
tween the free and slave states', without such a general revolu- 
tion as should render disunion unnecessary, would do anything, 
directly, for the cause of freedom, further than to relieve the 
people of the North, and detach them from the support of the 
foul system. In such a case there would indeed be a still 
more appalling prospect than there now is, of that terrible 
remedy, at which humanity herself shudders, unless, by timely 
repentance, the South should avert the catastrophe. Yet the 
principle of self-preservation, not less than the duty of clear- 
ing their own skirts from the guilt of oppression, should impel 
all who fear God ami love liberty, to choose, in sadness, the 



IX THE UNITED BTATEb. 579 

only alternative presented to them. To remain voluntarily 1 in 
the Union under a Constitution that must be thus construed, 
would be suicidal to ourselves, as well as treason against man- 
kind, and rebellion against God. Common prudence, to say 
nothing of principle or of piety, should suffice to direct, in so 
clear a case, a people not judicially blinded. The "patriot- 
ism" and the "chivalry" the " honor" and the " magnanimity," 
■sagacity'' and the "prudence," that could deliberately 
plant themselves against every " attribute of the Almighty" 
and every instinct of human nature, in opposition to every 
principle of law, and every element of social order — and all 
this under the hallucination or the pretext of being " orderly 
and law abiding" — invite epithets which we are unwilling 
to use. 

The Second Theory — that of "the Compromises," may appear 
less appalling, at the first view, but it deserves serious inquiry, 
whether this be anything more than mere appearance. 

An attempted " compromise" between moral right and mo- 
ral wrong, results always in the ascendency of the wrong, and 
the overthrow of the right. In matters of civil government, 
in politics, in legislation, in jurisprudence, this is as certain as 
everywhere else. The history of the Slavery Question in 
America furnishes lamentable illustrations in point. 

The friends of liberty-, adhering to the Constitution, yet ad- 
mitting its "compromises" and promising to fulfd them, admit 
themselves to be compromising with moral wrong ! What, 
then, becomes of their moral power? If anything deserving 
the name of success, is to come from the pursuit of this policy, 
the historical verification of it is yet future. The annals of 
the world, thus far, have not supplied it. The good Provi- 
dence of God, in spite of their moral obliquities and compro- 
mises, ma}' - have delivered an oppressed people. But their 
compromises have never deserved the credit of it, any more 
than the idolatries of the Hebrews deserved the credit (as I 
stupidly fancied,) of having supplied them with bread.* 

* Jeremiah 44 : 



530 THE SLAVERY QUESTION 

If the "Compromises of the Constitution" include — as they 
are commonly understood to do — the " guaranty" of the right 
(under any restrictions) to reclaim fugitives, and the "guaran- 
ty" of northern assistance in suppressing a servile insurrec- 
tion, then the construction that concedes these compromises, 
concedes the most atrocious as well as the most effective 
supports of slavery included in that ultra southern construc- 
tion which the masses at the North so indignantly repudi- 
ate ! Conceding these, very little more would be lost, in a 
moral view, by conceding the whole. 

And the extent of the moral concession is the measure of 
the political. An effort in Congress, or at the ballot box, 
against slavery, conceding the sacredness of the " compro- 
mises" with the "guaranties" involved in them, is an effort 
for victory after having relinquished the main controversy in 
debate. Such efforts must be abortive of course. By the 
operation of well known laws of human nature, they generally 
fail of reaching the low point at which they are aimed. And 
if reached, only an unsightly limb is displaced, leaving the 
root untouched and the trunk less offensive and, perhaps, the 
more thrifty and vigorous for the pruning. 

That local and partial victories may sometimes be gained 
by this policy is not denied. But a wise general knows that 
a local victory may be purchased too dearly. A political 
victory is always purchased too dearly, when it is done by a 
moral compromise, or when the victor, by his compromises, 
concessions, and pledges, ties up his own hands, and fore- 
closes himself from doing his main work. 

If it be true that the Constitution does contain the " com- 
promises and the guaranties " commonly attributed to it, even 
at the North, then the main battle between slavery and free- 
dom cannot be fought under it, nor otherwise than by a re- 
pudiation of it, or the proposal of such amendments as would 
be regarded as revolutionary to insist upon. And however 
wise it might be for the friends of liberty to avail themselves 
of any advantages thrown in their way, to weaken or cripple 
the slave power, (taking care to avoid giving sanction to any 



IX T1TK UNITED STATES. ■'• : 1 

constitutional compromises) it would be evidently impolitic 
for them to expend their main strength and wear out their 
energies and dishearten their successors in labors which, if 
never so successful, would leave their main work unaccom- 
plished and even unat tempted, after all. The longer the 
friends of liberty busy themselves in this manner, the more 
firmly will they establish the precedents which, sooner or 
later, must be rebelled against and spurned. 

If the Constitution be a "compromise" between slavery 
and freedom, then those who adhere to it, giving their assent 
to the compromise, yet expecting to "secure the blessings of 
liberty" under it for "themselves and their posterity," are 
only acting over again the folly of their fathers, but with less 
excuse, after having witnessed the experiment of the last sixty 
years. The fruits borne by the tree of "compromise" thus 
far, should warn us to expect nothing better of it in future. 

Of the third theory of the Constitution, that which repu- 
diates all its supposed "compromises" and "guaranties," it is 
sufficient to say that, if it he correct, it is all that could be de- 
sired as a basis of political action. In the words of another, 

" Those who believe that slavery is unconstitutional, are the only persons 
who propose to abolish it. They are the only ones who claim to have tie 
power to abolish it. Were the whole North to become abolitionists, they 
would still be unable to touch the chain of a single slave so long as they 
should concede that slavery is constitutional. 

" The mass of men will insist on seeing that a thing can be done, before 
they will leave the care of other interests to assist in doing it. Hence the 
slow progress of all political movements based on the admission that slavery 
is constitutional." — Spooner. 

These considerations should not tempt us to put an unwar- 
rantable construction upon our great national document. But 
they should induce a candid and thorough investigation of 
the matter, with a determination to take the position de- 
manded by a discovery of the truth of the case. If the or- 
ganic structure of our National Government does indeed cast 
us at the feet of the Slave Power, bound hand and foot, let 
us know the worst of the case, and in view of it, determine 



582 THE SLAVERY QUESTION 

whether we have strength and resolution to cut the cords, or 
whether we will submit to be slaves, with our posterity, for- 
ever. But if we have in our hands the Charter of Freedom, 
let us understand its use, and the responsibilities with which 
it invests us. 



IX TEE UNITED STATES. 583 



CHAPTER L. 

THE SLAVERY QUESTION IN AMERICA AND THE CRISIS. — WHAT 
SHALL BE DONE? 

Effects of Compromise thus far— Shall it be repeated or continued ?— The Slavery 
question, as it now stand?, stated— Must be settled by the Church and in the 
State— A question for the people— Can the Church and the State be reformed, 
and wielded against Slavery ?— Questions behind these — What is the organic 
structure of the Church and the State ?— Fallacy of the idea that the Federal 
G ivernment can occupy a neutral position, divorced from the support of Slavery, 
yet not wielded effectively against it— Fallacy of the idea that the peculiar struc- 
tare of our Government relieves us from responsibility in respect to Slavery — 
Suggestions concerning what might be done. The Church — Can the polities of a 
people, or of reformers, rise above the level of their religion 1 — Responsibility of 
the Church and its constituent members. 

The reader of the preceding pages will, by this time, com- 
prehend something of the magnitude of the pending slave 
question in America. Though, primarily a question concern- 
ing: the liberation of the enslaved, there is involved in it the 
question of the civil and political liberties of the nominally 
free. And the crisis seems to have arrived, predicted by one 
of our prominent statesmen, at the time our present Federal 
Government was organized. 

" I have no hope that the stream of general liberty will forever flow un- 
polluted through the mire of partial bondage, or that they who have been 
habituated to lord it over others, will not, in time, become base enough to 
let others lord it over them. If they resist, it will be the struggle of pride 
and selfishness, not of principle." — Wm. Pinckney's Speech in the House of 
Delegates of Maryland, 1789. 

The North has submitted to compromise on this subject till 
one of her own Senators taunts her with infidelity to her con- 
stitutional engagements, if she insists upon any legal securities 



584 THE SLAVERY QUESTION 

for the personal liberties of her own citizens, the Senator him- 
self not excepted ;* and he exhorts her to conquer her " pre- 
judices" in favor of liberty, for the sake of preserving "the 
Union f 

The Slavery Question in America is the question whether 
liberty shall be relinquished, for the security of slavery, or 
whether slavey shall be overthrown by the spirit of liberty. 
It is the question whether civil government shall secure and 
protect human rights, or whether a ruthless despotism, dis- 
placing civil government, (properly so called,) shall be wielded 
by the Slave Power for the subjugation of freemen. It is the 
question whether the Federal Government shall be thus 
wielded by a petty oligarchy of one or two hundred thousand 
slaveholders, over twenty millions of people, (one person con- 
trolling one hundred,) or whether it shall be a republican 
government, amenable to all, and administered for the pro- 
tection of all. 

It is, moreover, the question whether Christianity in Ame- 
rica shall overthrow heathenism in America, or be corrupted 
or exterminated by it. It is the question whether the Bible, 
the Church, and the ministry, shall suffer the disgrace of 
being accounted the handmaids of oppression, or whether they 
shall be hailed as the deliverers of the captives, proclaiming 
the Jubilee of the Lord. 

This great question is to be decided, mainly, by the concur- 
rent action of the two great social institutions of the country, 
the Church, and the State, the ecclesiastical and the civil 
power. 

It is for THE PEOPLE of the non-slaveholding States to 
say whether these two social institutions shall be redeemed 
from the foul embraces of slavery, and wielded for their hea- 
ven-appointed ends, or whether they shall remain, as at pre- 
sent, in the hands of their enemies. 

And the question whether THE PEOPLE will ever effect 



* If Daniel Webster were seized as a slave, he could have no legal redress under 
the Fugitive Slave bill, to which lie urges our submission. 



IN THE UNITED STATES. 585 

the requisite reformation in the Church and the State will 
depend, very much, on the ideas they attach to the organic 
structure of the Church and the State, and of their own parti- 
cipancy in the administration of their powers. 

If the Christians of the Free States conceive of the Church 
as a notorious something in the hands of the priesthood, 
above the control of the brotherhood, to which they arc reli- 
giously bound to adhere, right or wrong, and go wherever it 
carries them, it is evident that there will be no reformation in 
the Church. 

If the voting citizens of the Free States conceive of " the 
Government" as something distinct from themselves, and to 
which their allegiance is unchangeably due, — if they conceive 
of the " Constitution " as pledged to " compromises and guar- 
anties " in favor of slavery, and yet hold themselves bound to 
fulfil those unrighteous compromises and guaranties, thus 
elevating the Constitution (though conceded to be criminal) 
'above all that is called God or is worshiped' — it is evident 
that there will be no reformation in the State. 

And if there is to be no reformation in the Church or the 
State, it is evident that the sun of American liberty must go 
down m darkness, or be subjected to a baptism in blood. 

The questions arise — " What shall be done ?" And " IIow 
shall it be done ?" 

The field may be narrowed, by first inquiring, in the light 
of the past, and on the stand-point of the present, what ought 
not to be done ? 

May we not clearly detect some of the main fallacies by 
which the friends of liberty have been misled, and by which 
they have been foiled ? 

Expedients — compromises — gradualisms — postponements — 
ameliorations — have not the friends of liberty been baffled 
sufficiently by confiding implicitly in these ? 

Attempts to overthrow slavery merely by localizing it — 
preventing its expansion — prohibiting the slave trade, or the 
transportation of slaves — excluding slavery from new territo- 
ries — Is it not time to understand that the work of abolishing 



536 THE SLAVERY QUESTION 

slavery is not to be accomplished by directing attention and 
effort chiefly to enterprises of this character? 

Every opportunity should, doubtless, be improved, to do, 
in the use of proper measures, whatever presents itself to be 
done in these directions. But is it wise, as a matter of policy 
— can it be right, as a question of morals, to postpone or com- 
promise the main question of abolishing slavery, in order to 
concentrate strength or enlist numbers, on points of secondary 
importance ? May we consent to one crime for the sake of 
repressing another ? Especially where the greater is indulged 
that the smaller may be abolished ? May we — or may civil 
government — consent to regulate and thus authorize crime, 
for the purpose of curtailing its mischiefs ? 

Is there not a fallacy in the idea that the Federal Govern- 
ment can be divorced from the support of slavery without 
being enlisted against it, and so enlisted as to treat it as illegal 
and criminal ? 

How shall the Federal Government be thus divorced with- 
out so exerting itself as to overthrow slavery ? 

In organizing the militia, in providing for the collection of 
the revenue, (whether through the Custom-house or by direct 
taxation,) in providing for the transportation of the mails, in 
appointing Post-masters and all other officers of Government, 
in making enlistments for the army and navy, in naturalizing 
or in refusing to naturalize all classes of aliens — in making or 
refusing to make compensation to slaveholders for losses of 
slaves in the public service — must not the Federal Govern- 
ment take sides, one way or the other, on the question of the 
legality of slavery, and of the right of the slaves to their free- 
dom ? And is not the practical decision of the Federal Gov- 
ernment, in either case, entirely conclusive of the whole 
matter? Could the condition of slavery be continued, if the 
practice of the Federal Government did not acknowledge its 
legality? And while acknowledging its legality, can it be 
said to be divorced from the support of slavery ? Can it be 
neutral on that question, taking neither the one side or the 



IN THE UNITED STATES. 587 

other? Or, (however constituted,) has it any moral right to 
be neutral, were it possible to be so ? 

Can the United States "guaranty to every. State in this 
Union a republican form of Government." without aboli 
Slavery? Or can they neglect doing this without sustaining 
and being responsible for Slavery ? 

Is there not a fallacy in the common assumption (admitted 
by some of the friends of liberty) that the peculiar structure 
of our Federal Government, with its delegated powers, its 
limitations, and the reserved rights of the States, relieves the 
Government and the people of the free States from their 
responsibilities in respect to slavery in the slave States, provided 
the Federal Government prohibits it elsewhere ? 

Can man by his skill, or by his want of skill, in the con 
struction of a Constitution of Government, relieve that Gov- 
ernment of the essential duties devolving upon all civil 
Governments, in the nature of things, in the. nature of civil 
Government itself, and by the express appointment of God ? 

Can there be a civil Government not invested with the pre- 
rogative, and charged with the duty, of protecting human 
rights, and " executing justice between a man and his neigh- 
bor?" .If the Bible or the Declaration of Independence be 
resorted to for an answer, will they not unitedly respond, Not 
Is there any intelligible theory of civil Government that will 
not require at its hands thus much? Docs the Constitution 
of the United States, in its Preamble, profess less? Can it 
claim the allegiance, or deserve the confidence of the people, 
if it j^rfurms less ? Ilavc the Sovereign People, who arc 
responsible for the organic structure as well as for the admin- 
istration of their Government, any moral right to construct 
and continue an arrangement which contemplates less? Or 
can their liberties be secure under such an arrangement ? 

The Federal Constitution either describes a civil Govern- 
ment or it does not,* If it does, then that Government is 



* The great problem of 1737, was the formation of a National Government that 
ohouid supersede the " Confederation," and yet leave the. Stat* Governments in 



588 THE SLAVERY QUESTION 

charged with the essential duties of a civil Government. If it 
does not describe a civil Government, then we are without any 
National Government. We are reduced to a mere confed- 
eracy of the States. And if we have only a confederacy of 
States, may it not be dissolved at the option of either of the 
parties ? And are not the free States doubly inexcusable for 
remaining perpetually in a confederacy that binds them to 
restore fugitives and assist in suppressing an insurrection of 
slaves ?* 

The questions again recur — What shall be done? And 
how shall it be done ? 

Without presuming to dogmatize, may we adventure a few 
farther suggestions? 

The powers of the Federal Government — the legality or 
the illegality of slavery — its agreement or disagreement with 
the Constitution — present, evidently, questions of the first 
magnitude, and of vital importance in disposing of the pro- 
blem— "What shall be done?" 

Would it not be the part of wisdom, in the friends of lib- 
erty, in the first place, to examine thoroughly, and settle 
definitely, those questions? Can there be efficient and united 
political action against slavery till these questions are settled ? 

If it be found that shivery is illegal, that it is unconstitu- 
tional, that the Federal Government has full power over it, 
the course of action becomes plain. The Federal Courts, sus- 









existence. After great labor, the paradox was supposed to have been solved. It 
remains to be seen whether the exultation was not premature. The common theory, 
aceordiug to one of its ablest advocates, concedes that " the Federal Government 
is not a complete civil Government"— but nevertheless adds: " It does not follow, 
and it is not true, that we have no National Government." 

The concession then is, that we have only, in part, a National Government ;— an 
incomplete Government. And the precise point in respect to which its incom- 
pleteness is conceded, is the point in which it fails "to secure the blessings of lib- 
erty" for "the people of the United States" — and some other little things of that 
character. A somewhat significant incompleteness— like the performance of " the 
Drama of Hamlet, with the part of Hamlet left out, by particular request." 

* United States' forces were used to suppress the Southampton insurrection of 
negroes in 1831. And, more recently, they were employed to capture a company of 
Maryland slaves who were marching off in pursuit of freedom. And every execu- 
tion of the Fugitive Slave bill is of the same character 



IX THE UNITED MATES. 589 

tained by Congress and the Executive, are adequate to admin* 

ister the remedy. And the power is in the hands of the non- 
slaveholding States. 

The investigation itself might be carried on, to a great 
extent, by bringing questions, involving the rights of slaves 
and others, for decision before the Federal Courts, after the 
example, and with the untiring perseverance of Granville 
Sharp. 

If it comes to be conceded, after a fair investigation, that 
the Constitution is in favor of slavery, and that it provides no 
remedy against it, the question returns again — "What shall 
be done ?" 

An amendment of the Constitution might be proposed, but 
it requires the concurrence of two-thirds of the States to carry 
it into effect. There seems little prospect of a remedy in that 
direction. 

Involution or disunion appear to be the only direct political 
remedies that remain. We may conceive of a revolution that 
should carry with it, or bring after it, the abolition of slavery. 
The ground of disunion would then be removed. But the 
mind shudders at the thought of a revolution by violence. 

Might there not be effected a peaceful separation betwo ■:, 
the slaveholding and non-slaveholding States? If a majority 
of the citizens at the North and at the South should concur, 
why could it not be done? If the Constitution makes no 
provision for such an emergency, does it follow that an Ad- 
ministration is bound to enforce union by the sword ? Or 
why might not a vote of two-thirds of the States (Northern 
and Southern) unite in an amendment of the Constitution for 
that end? 

The Union has its value, but is it anything more than that 
of a means to an end? And what is that end worth, if it 
does not include justice, security, freedom, and the right to 
obey God ? 

What other alternative remains but the loss of the main 
objects for which the independence of the country was 
achieved, and the Constitution and the Union established ? 



590 THE SLAVERY QUESTION 

Is anything to be gained by clinging to that which was de- 
signed to be the means, if, in doing it, we must sacrifice ike 
end f 

The general and public discussion of these questions would 
arrest the attention of all classes of citizens, Northern and 
Southern. If any other alternatives exist, they would be 
discovered and presented. If the South loved slavery more 
than the Union, she would say so. If the North loved the 
Union more than liberty, she would say so. The issue would 
be presented to every citizen, and it would have to be met at 
the ballot-box and decided. If the friends of liberty at the 
North were left in the minority, and the country ruined under 
the avenging hand of divine justice, they would then be clear 
of the blame. But would the impartial award of posterity 
acquit them, if, adhering to a Constitution of "compromises 
and guaranties" in favor of slavery, they bartered their prin- 
ciples, their consciences, and the liberties of their country,.for 
an idolized "union" with oppressors? Would it acquit the 
entire generation of northern citizens who, in full view of the 
crisis, should consign themselves and their posterity to the 
degradation of vassalage? Would not their own Declaration 
of self-evident truths, and of the rights and responsibilities 
of freemen, upbraid them? 

" We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal , 
that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, among 
which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. That, to secure 

THESE RIGHTS, GOVERNMENTS ARE INSTITUTED AMONG MEN, deriving their 

just powers from the consent of the governed ; that whenever any form 
of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the RIGHT 
OF THE PEOPLE to alter or abolish it, and to institute a new Gov- 
ernment, laying its foundation on such principles, and organizing its powers 
in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and 
happiness." 

Whatever sentiments may mould the answers that shall be 
returned to these questions, the issue to be met and disposed of 
will remain, if we mistake not, very much as has been stated 
already. That is to say: If the Constitution contains the 
"compromises and guaranties" commonly attributed to it; 



EN THE UNITED STATIC. 591 

if there is no prospect of its being amended, or of the speedy 

abolition of slavery by the States; then the frc have 

no remedy but revolution or disunion. Rejecting this, they 
must continue to participate in the guilt of slavery, 
suffer its evils, includii own subjugation by the | 

oligarchy of slaveholders. But if the Constitution contains 
no such "compromises and guaranties," then they hold the 
power in their own hands, and may readily redeem themse 
and their country if they will, by the proper administration 
of the Government. 

This view presents what we understand to be the Shivery 
Question in . 1 mt rica, so far as the prospect of its abolition by 
the action o£ civil government and the political action of the 
North are concerned. 

The Church question is still more comprehensive, more 
vital, and more solemn. If the religion of a county controls, 
of necessity, the legislation of a country, then the Church, to 
the full extent to which it moulds or represents the religion 
of a country, or is able to mould and represent it, is responsi- 
ble for its political morality. Is it not so? 

Can the political morality of a people rise higher than the 
religion of a people ? Can the political morality of reformers 
rise higher than the religion of reformers ? Can their re- 
ligion rise, permanently, above the religion of the Churches 
to which they adhere, and of the ministry in whom they con- 
Sde for religious instruction ? Will they be likely to demand 
of their political parties, or to secure in the management and 
direction of them a higher tone of morality than they require 
of their Churches, or than actually prevails in them? Docs 
the history of past experiments warrant the belief that it can 
be so ? Or would it be honorable to religion and religious 
institutions, to believe that such could be the fact, and that 
the world should be the teacher and exemplar of the Church ? 

The friends of liberty and pure religion, to a considerable 
extent, have been impressed with the importance of so direct- 
ing their missionary efforts, as to send none but a pure and 
liberty loving religion to the heathen. They are contributing 



592 THE SLAVERY QUESTION 

their missionary benefactions accordingly. But, are they, in 
all cases, sustaining and confiding in no other religion at 
home ? Are they supporting by their contributions and by 
their approving attendance, no teachers of religion whom 
they would not entrust with the work of carrying the gospel 
to the heathen? Is it probable that they will consistently and 
perse veringly insist on exporting a better religion for the ac- 
ceptance of the heathen abroad, than that which they cherish 
and confide in for their own edification and the benefit of 
their families at home ? Or, will it be practicable, to any ex- 
tent, or for any great length of time, to find missionaries of 
liberty to send abroad, who have been nurtured in the bosom 
of pro-slavery churches at home, — churches that remain in 
fellowship with oppressors, that cherish the arrangements of 
caste, that set up in the sanctuary of prayer the negro pew, and 
that welcome to their communion, without remonstrance, the 
politicians whose votes rivet the fetters of the slave ? 

Or is it to be believed that the peaceful abolition of slavery 
is to be effected by the labors of those who thus contribute to 
its support ? Can the consciences of the slaveholders be thus 
reached? Can Christian missionaries be sustained in the 
slave States to build up churches there, having no fellowship 
with slavery (for this is one department of our " Free Mis- 
sions") by Christians at the North who remain in churches 
holding fellowship with slavery, and who support its apolo- 
gists as religious teachers? Are the Choctaw and Cherokee 
Churches to be disowned and abandoned for retaining slave- 
holders in their communion, by Christians at the North re- 
maining in ecclesiastical connection with the slaveholders of 
the South, or holding fraternal ecclesiastical correspondence 
with them ? Or, retaining religious fellowship with the cor- 
rupt and servile northern demagogues who are more guilty 
than the slaveholders themselves ? Can the friends of liberty 
and pure religion continue long to remonstrate with churches 
in fellowship with slavery, while their own position is such as 
has been described ? If the churches have any responsibility 
in respect to slavery, is there no inconsistency in the position 



IN THE UNITED STATES. 593 

of such ? What is the responsibility of churches aside from 
the responsibilities of the members of which the Church ia 

composed? And how can the individual member urge upon 
the body a position which he is not ready to take himself? 

" There is no power out of the Church," says Albert Barnes, 
•' that could sustain slavery an hour, if it were not sustained 
in it." To this we may add the inquiry — How long would 
slavery be sustained in the churches, if churches sustaining 
slavery were not sustained by those who complain of their 
position ? If a solemn responsibility rests on the churches, is 
it not shared by those in the churches whose support con- 
tributes to sustain them? 

There is still another view of the subject. Suppose it were 
not true that the position of the Church could decide the fate 
of American slavery ? Suppose it were certain that, notwith- 
standing all that could be done by the Church and ministry 
to overthrow slavery, it would still live and thrive ? "Would 
the responsibility of the Church and ministry then cease? 
Would it not still be their duty to bear their testimony in the 
midst of a perverse people? How else can they shine as 
lights in the world ? How else can they honor their God and 
their Savior? How else can they teach and exemplify pure 
religion? How else can they call sinners to repentance? 
How else can they preserve a pure seed to survive the terri- 
ble overthrow of the nation, or its dark night of disgrace and 
servility, to take root and germinate and bear fruit in a more 
genial age ? 

And if it be true, as we have seen, that the Federal Govern- 
ment cannot hold a neutral position — that it cannot be di-„ 
vorced from the support of slavery without being wielded 
against it — if its peculiar structure — fashioned by man — can- 
not absolve it nor its constituent members from the responsi- 
bilities involved in the very nature of the institution itself — 
how much more clearly and more forcibly do these considera- 
tions apply to the Church, established by Christ himself, to be 
"the salt of the earth," and "the light of the world!" 



GENERAL INDEX. 



[N. B. (1.) The leading topics of this Book, arranged in Chapters, will be found 
in the Contents, at the beginning. (2.) Minor topics, in their order, are ii 
under the several head titles, at tho beginning of each Chapter. (8.) This General 
Index, though containing many names, does not include, however, (except in a few 
special cases,) the names of the numeixms authorities that will be found cited in the 
body of the work.] 



Aberdeen, Lord, 66. 

Abolition of Slave Trade, by Great Bri- 
tain, 63. 
Abolition of Slave Trade, by IT. S, 63 

of Slaverv in England, 42. 

British Colonies, 353, 372. 

British E. Indies, 376. 

Massachusetts, 109-11. 

New Hampshire, 109-13. 

Vermont, 110. 

Pennsylvania, 112. 

Rhode Island, 113. 

New York, 111-17. 

Connecticut, 114. 

New Jersey, 115. 

Mexico, 272, 370. 

Roman Empire, Europe, Chili. 

Buenos Ayres, Guadaloupe, Gape 

of Good Hope, 370. 
Abolition Societies, (last century) 95. 
Abolition movement, U. S., present, 382. 
Abolitionists, their principles and mea- 
sures, 398. 
Abolitionists, opposition against, 399. 

slanders against, 402. 

mobs against, -104. 

attempted legal suppression of, 
408. 

elements of division among, 417. 

agreement in 1833, 452. 

changes afterwards, 464. 

divisions in 1840. 457. 



u Abstractionists," 448. 

Adams, John, Pies., 73, 241. 

Adams, Samuel, 73. 

Adams John (>., 78, 219, -J 15, 257, 263, 

274, 327, 388, 423, 577. 
Adams, Chas. F., 47S. 
Addison, Joseph, 29. 
Alabama — African Slave Trade, 262. 

demand on Gov. of N. Y., 413. 
Albany Convention, (1839.) 470, 513. 

"(1840,) 471. 
Alliance of Aristocracies, Northern and 

Southern, 334. 
Althorpe, Lord 371. 
Alton Observer, 459 : mob and murder, ib. 
American Slavery, features of. 377. 
American Revolution, period of 69. 

Hoard, (Missions) 202, 220. 

Home Mission Society, 209. 

Bible Society, 210. 

Tract Society, 213. 

Sunday School Union, 215. 

Missionary Association, 491. 

Anti-Slaverj So. (See below.) 

and For. A. S. So. (See below.) 
Amistad, captives, 255. 
Anderson, Robt. N., Rev., 411. 
Andover Then. Sem., 171. 
Audio.. Thoa Rev., 39& 
Andrews, Mr. Rev., (Ct.) 176. 
Andrews, Prof, 250. 
Antigua and Bermuda, 372. 



596 



GENERAL INDEX. 



Anti-Slavery efforts, last century, 91. 
Anti-Slavery Society, American, organ- 
ized, 396. Protest, to Pres., U. S., 
417.— Division, (in 1840,) 457, 462. 
— New measures, 464. 
General Policy, 511. — Political 
course, 517. — Second Revolution, 
(in 1844,) 526.— Difficulties, K P. 
Rogers, 529. Politics, (since 1844) 
532. — Course on Church action, 
541. — General Estimate, 555. 
Anti-Slaverv So. American and Foreign: 

Origin, 463.— Course, 510. 
Anti-Slavery So., Massachusetts, 457-62, 

512, 517, 519,521, 535. 
Arcade, N. Y. Convention, (1840) 471. 
Aristocracy, U. S., 126.— N. and S., 334. 
Articles of Confederation, 78, 573. 
Aves, Thos., (slave case) 111. 
Aydellotte, B. P., Dr., 492. 

Bacon, Leonard. Dr., 177, 206, 207. 
Bank, U. S., 327, 336. 
Bankruptcy, (of 1837) 249, (of 1811)328. 
Baltimore Conference, Meth., 148. 
Baptists in England, 60, 61, 190, 493, 494. 
Baptists in America, (in 1778) 108. 

Position, 183, 493.— Missions Che- 
rokees, 187. 

Am. and For. Bible So., 189, 507. 

Publication So., 190. 

Anti-Slavery agitation, 493. Bap- 
tist Magazine, 493. 

Va. Asso., 493. 

Triennial Con.. 187, 493-8. 501-2. 

Board For. Missions, 187. — Acting 
Board, 187, 500. 

Home Mission So., 188, 499, 502, 
506. 

Missionary Union, 503-5. 

Southern Convention, 501-2. 

Tennessee Missionary So. 501. 

Alabama Conv. and letter, 500. 

Anti-Slavery Conv., 496. — Free 

Mission Society, 499, 507. 
Barnes, Albert, Rev., 217. 
Barrow, David, Eld., 108. 
Barbour, Gov., 80. 
Barbadoes, 372. 
Baxter, Richard, 27. 
Baxter, G. A., Dr., 155. 
Bayard, James A., 97. 
Bayly, Mr., of Va, 572. 
Beattie, James, 30. 
Beecher, Geo., Rev., 157. 
Beman, N. S. S., Dr., 154. 
Benezet, Anthony, 36, 41. 
Benton, T. II., Hon., 274, 316, 318. 



Berkeley, Wm, Sir, 20, 229. 
Bermuda, (abolition) 372. 
Bethune, Dr., 346. 
Bible Society, American, 210. 

American and Foreign, 189, 507. 

Convention concerning, 546-7. 
Bibles for Slaves, 210-12. 
Binney, J. G., Eld., 505. 
Birney, James G., 395, 406, 471. 
Blackstone, Judge, 28, 48, 49, 52. 
Blanchard, Jona., Pres., 202, 492. 
Blennerhasset, 284. 
Bloodhounds, 270. 
Boggs, Ex-Go v. Miss., 310, 313. 
Bolles, Lucius, Dr., 186. 
Bond, Dr., 147. 
Bond, Mr., (Boston) 419. 
Book Concern, Methodist, 149. 
Boston Recorder, 182. 
Boothe, Abraham, 30, 60, Gl. 
Boyd, A. H. H., Rev., 164. 
Boynton, C. B., Rev., 492. 
Bradley, Dr. (Plymouth), 419. 
Breckenridge, R. J. Dr., 343. 
Brisbane, Dr., 395, 492. 
Brissot, 31. 
British Colonial Slavery, 6, 7. 

Constitution, 51. 

Orders in Council, 329. 
Brodnax, Mr. (Va.) 343. 
Brooklyn Report, Am. Board, 204-6. 
Brougham, Henrv, M.P., 355, 35S-9, 362 
Brown, Abel, Eld., 189. 
Brown, Moses, 398. 
Buffon, 31. 
Buffalo Conv. nora. J. P. Hale, 478. 

M. Van Buren, 478. 
Burchell, Mr., Missionary W. I., 366. 
Burke, Edmund, 28. 
Burleigh, C. C, 463, 556. 
Burling, Wm., 40. 
Burnett, P. H., of Mo., 310. 
Burr, Aaron, Col., 280, 284. 
Burr, James E., 440. 
Bushyhead, Mr., Missionary, 187. 
" Business men," 448. 
Butler, Bishop, 28. 

Buxton, Thomas Fowell, 67, 365, 358, 
303, 369, 371. 

Calhoun, John C, 279, 301-2, 316, 321, 
330, 334, 336, 339, 420-1. 

California, acquisition of, 287 ; posses- 
sion, 300; results, 306; effort to 
exclude slavery, 307 ; counter efforts, 
308; Southern plan, 310; Provi- 
sional Government, 312; Constitu- 
tion vs. Slavery, 313. 



GENERAL INDEX. 






Camden (S. C.) Bap. Church, 196. 
Campbellites, 198. 
Campbell, Alexander, 108. 

Canning Mi., -.v;, ;;.vs. 

Canterbury Colored School, 398, 486. 

Capres, W. Dr., 148. 

Cariba or Charibs, 4. 

Cartwrigbt (slave case), 50. 

Cass, Gen., 808, 816. 

Cemeteries, col'd people excluded, 200. 

Census of Slaves, 114—1-6. 

'• Centralization," 466. 

Channing, W. E. Dr., 419, 560. 

Chaplin, Wm. I... 246, 446, 463, 556. 

Charles V., 5, 16. 

Charleston (S. C.) Asso. Bap., 18 1. 

rifling the mails, -11 1. 
Chase, Samuel, Judge, 96. 
Chase,S. 1'., Hon., 226. 
Chailiam-St. Chapel, mob, 395. 
Cheivres, 5. 16. 
Cherokees, Bap Miss, 187. 

Am. Board, 203. 
Cherokees and Georgia, 389. 
Choctaw-, Missions, 203. 
Chronicle, Vermont, 182. 
Christian Mirror, 182. 

Spectator, 181. 

Observer, 205. 

Anti-Slavery Conv., 48S, 492. 
Churchman, The, 192. 
Churches, American, decline, 135. 

position, 143-219. 
Church — Why scrutinized, 419. 
Church and Ministry, responsibilities, 558. 
Church Anti-Slavery agitation, 487. 

re-organization, 489; Independ- 
ent, 489 ; Wesleyan, 489 ; 
Free Presb., 490 ; Friends, 
491. 
Cinquez (African), 255. 
Clarence, Duke of, 59. 
Clarkson, Thomas, 56-9, 66, 355-60, 393, 

444. 
Clarke. Adam, Dr., 29. 
Clarkaon, Matthew, Gen.. 96. 
t 'lav, Henry, 140, 244, 251, 264-6, 274-6, 

' 301, 316-17, 342-7, 380-3, 566. 
Clayton, J. M., 310. 

Clergy, opposition of, 402, 411-12, 425. 
" Clerical Appeal," 459, 542. 
Clinton Hall, meeting, mob, 395. 
Coke, Lord, 145. 

Colonies, Am., dates settlement, 19; As- 
sociation of, 177 1, 72. 
Colonies, Brit., abolition, 353, 372. 376. 
Colonial Charters, 18; Slavery, 10. 

Legislation, 18. 



Colonization Society, I I 

401, 107, LIS, i. 

Meeting, ! 
Colombian Republii 
Columbian < lollege, 
Colver, Nathl. Eld., 50 
Common Law, English, I 
Commerce, Northern, 828. 
Compromise, Missouri, 2 10 8, 

of is. -n. 817. 
Comet, Brig, 262, 
Connecticut, Colonial Slavery, 11-13. 

action (in 177 1), 7."). 

Abol. Soc 1 1790 

Gen. A Sao. (Cong.), 173, 429-30. 
V black laws" 840. 
Cone, Spencer II. Eld., 187 -'.'. 190, 498, 

497-9, 503-4. 
Continental Congress, 78-9. 
Congress, U. S., 100,224-6, 234-6, 240, 

251, 268, 278, 299, 801, 331. 
Congress of Panama, 259. 
Congregationalists, position, 168; pub- 
lications. 181. 
Associations, 17:'.. 129-30. 
Constitution U. S. (see Federal Const) 
Convention Cong. Min., Mass.. 180. 
Convention (of 1789), 83. 
Conventions, Chr. A. S., 488-92. 

(See names of places.) 
Conspiracy, Burr's, 280. 
Corporation and Test Acts, 361. 
Cotton Gin, Whitney's, 132. 
Cotton manufacture, effects, 134, 334. 

speculation, 2 19. 
Court of King's Bench, IS. 
••Covenanters," 198, 533. 
Cox, S. H. Dr., 157. 
Cox and Hoby, 494. 
Crandall, Prudence, 393, 486. 
(Vandall, Reuben, Dr., 246, 437. 
Crancb, Win. Judge, 234, 244-5. 
Creole, Brig, 254. 
Crummel, Alex., 193. 
Cuba, Slavery and C. s. Gov't, 265. 
Cumberland Presbyterians, 198. 
Curtiss, II. Rev, 160. 
Curtis. Ceo., of 11. I., 419. 

Dana, Rev. Dr.. 172. 

Davenport. Mr. (Missionary), 187. 

Dayton, Mr. i 0. S. Senate), 570. 

Decline of Liberty. 118. 

Declaration of Independence, original 

draft, 16. 
Constitutional law, 57 I. 
Delaware (in 1786), LOS -10. 
Democratic party, 128, 131. 



598 



GENERAL INDEX. 



De Witt, Rev. Dr., 208. 

Dew, Prof., 250. 

Derby, Rev. Dr., 350. 

D'Wolf, James, 11. 

Dickey and Beman, Messrs., Presb. Gen. 

Assemblv, 154. 
Diplomacy, U. S., 252, 263. 
Direct Taxes, 322. 
" Disciples," 198. 

District of Columbia, (see Federal Dist.) 
Doane, Bishop, 193. 
Dominicans, 27. 
Dorr, T. W., 420. 
" Dough-faces," origin of, 384. 
Douglass, Frederick, 556. 
Douglas, Mr. (111.), 308. 
Dove, James, Eld., 61. 
Drayton and Sayres, 246, 446. 
Dresser, Amos, 105, 438. 
Drummond, Rev. Mr., 145. 
" Due process of law," 5*75-6. 
Duffield, Rev. Dr., 157. 
Dunbar, Duncan, Eld., 188. 
Dundas, Mr. (M. P.), 61. 
Dutton, S. W. S. Rev., 176. 
Dutch Ref. Church, 195. 

Earle, Thomas, 471. 

Eaton, Wm, Gen., 282. 

Eddy, Samuel, Hon. (R. I.), 384. 

Edmundson, Wm., 33. 

Edwards, Jona. Dr., 28, 92, 111, 127, 130. 

Edwards, (Texas), 273. 

Elizabeth, Queen, 6, 7, 8, 16, 50. 

Ellis, Mr., min. Mexico, 289. 

Ely, Mr. Rev., 176. 

" Emancipator," 392, 464. 

Emancipation, W. I., effects, 373. 

Embargo, 324. 

Emerson, Ralph, Prof., 172. 

Emmons. Nathl. Dr., 393-4. 

Emory, Bishop, 428. 

Emory, Robert, Rev., 145. 

Encomium, Brig, 252. 

Endicott, Gov., 229. 

England, Slavery and Abolition, 44. 

English Statutes, 18. 

" Enterprise, The," 152. 

Episcopal Church, 191. 

Everett, Edward, Gov., 218, 415. 

Eyre, James, Sir, 46. 

Faulkner, Mr., 80. 

Federal Constitution, era of, 81. 

Convention, framing, 83-4, 222. 

Ratifications, 84-5. 

Amendments, 89. 

Views of, 563. 



Federal Government, action, 220. 
Federal District, cession, 225. 

Slavery by act of Congress, 226. 

Government of, 234, 243. 
" Federalist* The," 86-7, 230. 
Federal party, 128, 132. 
Fee, John G, 492. 
Ferdinand V., Spain, 7. 
Fillmore, Pres., .162. 
Finney, C. G. Rev., 492. 
Finch, J., Missionary, 506. 
First Congress (1774), 71. 
First Presidency, 224. 
Fisk, Wilbur, Pres. 167. 
Florida, Invasion of, 269. 

Purchase, 239, 269. 

Admission, 240. 

Treaty — " Inhabitants citizens," 
239-40, 568. 

Seminole War, 270. 
Follen, Charles, Prof., 418, 469. 
Foote, C. C, 475. 
Foote, Mr., of Miss., 308. 
Forsyth, Mr., 277, 293. 
Foster, S. S , 527-30-33. 
Fox, C. J., 28, 62. 
Fox, Georo-e, 30, 32. 
Franklin, B. Dr., 30, 40, 54, 96, 100. 
Franklin and Armfield, 244. 
Freeman, Mr. Rev., 191. 
Free-Will Baptists, 196. 
Free Soil party, 478, 482. 
" Free trade and sailor's rights," 330. 
Free Missions, 491. 
Free Presb. Church, 491. 
Fremont, Col., 300. 
French National Assembly, 57-9. 
French Revolution, (1793) 130. 

Infidelity, 130. 
Frelinghuysen, Theodore, Hon., 395. 
"Friends" in England, 32, 60, 196. 

In America, 35, 435-6. 

Seceders, 491. 
Fugitive Slave Bill, (of 1793) 227. 

(of 1850.) 172, 220, 318,413. 
Fuller, R„ Eld, (S. C.) 188,499. 
Furmau, Rev. Dr., 186-7. 

Gallatin, Albert, 264. 

Galusha, Elon, Eld., 496, 499. 

Gaines, Gen., 277. 

Garrison, Wm. L., 396-7, 401, 405, 410, 

419, 436, 458-9, 460, 469, 512, 541, 

455-6. 
Gates, Horatio, Gen., 79. 
Gayle, Gov, (Ala.) 413. 
Gedney, Lieut., 255. 

i, ral Conf, Cong., (M«.) 180. 



GENERAL INDEX. 






i] Asso., Cong., (< i.i it:;. 429. 
General Asso. Cong., (Mass.) L78, I 
- Genius of Temperance," S92. 
•' Genius Universal Emancipation," 891. 

G ge II , an of, s , 66. 

Georgia, Colonial laws, 20-1. 

action, 1 177 I ) 7 1. 

demands, ill. 

African Slave Trade, 26L 

annual Conference, ( Meth.) 148. 
Ghotaon, Mr., (Va,,) 251, 274. 
Oilman, Gov., (N. 11 ) 281. 
Godwin, 27. 
Goderich, Lord. 369. 
Goodman, B., 492. 
( toodwin, 10. W., 485. 
( tanzalez, Anthony, 4, 16. 
i h mverneur, S. L , 410. 
Goslein, i Va.) Bap. Asso., 412. 
"Gradual abolition," tested, W. I., 857, 

872-8. 
Graham, Rev. Dr., 15S, 106, 170. 
Grand Jury, Oneida Co., 409. 

District Columbia, 244. 

Tuscaloosa, (Ala.) 414. 
Green, Beriah, Pres., 395-6, 556. 
Green, Mr., Sec Am. Board. 203. 
Green, Duff, Gen., 415. 
< Iregoin . Abbe, •">, 29. 
Grey, Earl, 371. 
Grosvenor, C. P., 468, 494, 507. 
Grotius, 28. 
Gurney, J. J, 371. 
Gwin, W. M, 310, 313. 

Hale, John P., 478. 

Ball, E., Rev., 176. 

Ballet, B. F., 418. 

Hamilton, Alex, Gen., 86, 95, 97, 281. 

Hannegan, Mr, 309. 

Hand, Col, 311. 

Hancock, John, 7S. 

Harrison. W. II. Gen., 520. 

Hawkins. John. Sir, (Capt.) 6, 16. 

Hayti, 180, 268, 370. 

Hazard, Mr.. (R I.) 415. 

Hedding, E., Bishop', 147-8. 428. 

Henry, King, (Spain) 1. 

Henry. Patrick, 7". 85. 

Beynck, Elizabeth, 355-6. 

Hicksite Friends, 485, 551. 

Bierra, 5. 

Billiard, Mr, 308. 

Hill, B. M,Eld, 188,497, 

Hispaniola, 4. 

Hoare, Mr, Hon, 340. 

Hodge, Prof, 154. 

Holly, Myron, 47 1 '. 47 I. 556. 



Holt, Chief Justice, Lord 
Home Missionary Bociet] . Ba| • I 
I [ome Missionary Boc , Ann rici 
Hopkins, Samuel, Dr., 28, 41, ^ 

111, 120 -2, 127. 
Hope, Mis . 865, 
Hopper, [saac '1'., 435, B 19. 
Borselej , Bishop 28, 62, 
Horton, Jotham, Rev., 190. 
House of Commons, 62 I 
House of Lord-., 62. 
Houston, Samuel, General, 279. 
Hubbard, Mr, Hon, 340. 
Hull. General, 882. 
Hutchinson, Judge, 39 I. 

Ide, Jacob, Dr., 448. 
Illinois Central Asso, 202. 

Gen. Cong. Asso., 204. 
Impressment Seamen, 329, 576. 
Indiana Ter, 241. 
Ingersoll, C. J, 301. 
Insurrection in Texas, 273. 
Invasion of Texas, 273. 
Iowa Ter, 24 1. 
Iredell, Judge, 85. 
Ives, L. s. Bishop, 191. 

" Jacobinism," 130. 

Jackson, Andrew, Pres., 267, 269,274, 

270-7. 286, 291, 338, 417. 
Jamaica, 370. 

.lames, John AogelL Rev., 360. 
Jay, John, Gov, 30, 86, 92, 95, 97. 
Jay, John, Esq, 191. 
.lav, Wm. Judge, 393, 511. 
Jefferson, Thomas, 16, 30, 70, 71-2, 79, 

83,86, 131, 142, 236, 268,281,324, 

569, 575. 
Jeremie, Judge. 363. 
Jocelyn, S. S, 392, 511. 
Johnson, Samuel, Dr., 28, 
Johnson. Wm. B. (S. C), 187. 
Jones, William, Sir, 31. 
Jones, C. C. Rev, 199. 
Jones, Com, 295. 
Judson, A. T., Judge, 255. 

Kearney, Gen.. 302. 
Kentucky (in 1780), 110. 

Admission of, 227. 

Presb. Svnod, 152. 
Kendall. Amos,'(P. M Gen.) 416-17. 
Kerr, John. 4 7. 

L. ; v, Francis s„ 105, 487,446 
King Henry of Spain, 4. 

King's Bench, Court, 50. 
King, Thos. B, 810, 318. 



600 



GENERAL INDEX. 



King, Leicester, Hon., 478. 

Knibb, "Win, Missionary (W. I.), SCO; 

Lacoste (slave Capt.), 257. 

Lamar, Gen, 279. 

Lane Seminary, 426. 

Langhorne, G. W. Rev. (N. C.) 428. 

Laird, Capt, 47. 

Las Casas, 4. 

Lay, Benjamin, 40. 

Lear, Tobias, 282. 

Leavitt, Joshua, 463. 

Leo X, Pope, 27. 

Leigh, B. W. (Va.), 80. 

Le Roy Convention, 523. 

Lewis, Thomas (slave), 48. 

Lewis, Evan, 393. 

Lewis, Samuel, 492. 

Liberty Party, 457, 467-8, 482. 

Liberty League, 475,477, 481. 

Liberia, 351-2. 

Liberator, 392, 397. 

Lincoln, Heman, 497. 

Lisle, David, 46. 

" Literary* and Theol. Review," 409, 413. 

Literary Institutions, 403. 

Liverpool, mob, 59. 

Locke, John, 30. 

Long, James, Texas, 273. 

Loring, E. G, 418. 

Louis XIII. of France, 7. 

Louisiana, purchase, 239. 

Af. Slave Trade, 261. 

" Inhabitants citizens," 239, 558. 
Lovejoy, E. P. Rev, 406, 439. 
Lumpkin, Gov. (Geo.), 410. 
Lundy, Benjamin, 385, 391-2. 436. 
Lun t," Geo, Hon, 418. 
Lushington, Dr., 363, 371. 

Macauley, Zachary, 358. 
Macedon Lock Convention, 475. 
Macknight, (Commentator) 29. 
McDuffie, Geo, Gov. S. C, 141, 413. 
Madison, James, Pros, 70, 79, 84, 86-7, 

102, 228, 230, 336. 
Malian, J. B, Rev, 440. 
Mahan, Asa, Pies, 492. 
Mails, U. S, laws, 233. 

Report, U.S. Senate, 421. 
Malcom, Howard, Rev, 493. 
Mansfield, Chief Justice, Lord, IS, 46, 48, 

50-1-2, 55. 
Mann, Horace, Hon, 226. 
Manufactures, N. England, 134,334, 336. 
Marriage, white women with slaves, 23. 
Maryland, Colon. Slavery. 22 : laws. 140 



Maryland, action, (1774) 74. — Abolition 
Society, (1789) 96. 

no legal slavery, 573. 

Colonization Society, 343. 
Martin Luther, (Md.) 82. 
Marcy, W. L, Gov, 413-14. 
Mariott, Charles, 435, 549. 
Massachusetts, Colonial Slavery, 1 2, 1 8. 

(in 1S12,) claims on U. S, 332-3. 

relations with S. C, and La, 340. 

Legislature, (of 1836) 417-18. 

Abolition Society, 401. 

Colonization Society, 350. 
Mason, Mr, of Va, U. S. Senate, 570-1. 
Masonic Hall, Colonization meeting, 395. 
May anniversaries, (1825 to '30) 3S7. 
May, Samuel J, Rev, 418, 476, 537. 
Mercer, Charles F, 250. 
Metamoras taken, 299. 
Methodist E. Church, 106-7, 138, 143-5. 
426. 

Division of, 150. 
Methodist E Church, North, 150. 
Mexico — abolition of slavery, 272-3. 

war against, 287, 299, 302.' 

claims U. S. on, 289, 293, 297. 

peace with, 303. 
Miller, Samuel, D.D, 152-3. 
Milnor, Rev. Dr, 193. 
Militia laws, U. S, 233. 
Mills, Samuel J, Rev, 341. 
Miller. M.D, Eld, 504. 
" Ministry,'* the, 449. 
Mississippi Territory, 241. 
Missouri, admiss. and comp, 240-3, 388. 
Missionary Societies, England, 368. 
Missionary enterprise, — effects, 386. 
Mobs against abolitionists, 395, 406. 
Monroe, James, Pres.. 240-2, 256-7, 269. 
Monroe Co, N. Y, Convention, 470. 
Montez and Ruiz, 255. 
Montgomery, James, 4, 5. 
Montesquieu, Baron, 2S. 
Monterey taken, 300. 
More, Hannah, 28. 
Morrell, Judge, 244. 
Morris, Thomas, 471. 
Mulgrave, Lord, 370. 
Murcb, W. H, Eld, 493. 

Nacogdoches, settlement, Am, 273. 
Napoleon vs. Hayti, 268. 
National Bank, 327, 336. 
" National Philanthropist," 391. 

"A. S. Standard," 514, 528, 544 

" Era," 483. 

Anti-Slavery Con v. (1833), 393. 
Naturalization laws, 235. 



GKXERAi. IN 



001 



Naturalization laws, power of Con 

through, 570, 586. 
Nat, Turner's insurrection, 892,688. 
Nelson, Dr. Rev.. 896,489. 
Neviu, E. H.. Rev, 492. 
New England, Colonial Slavery, 12-14. 

In War of L812, 832. 

Meth. EL Oonf, 148. 

Anti-Slavery Soc, 392. 
New Orleans Bible Soc, 211. 
Newport (R, L)Oong. Ch., 12. 
New School Gen. Assembly, 157. 
Ne,\ fork — Yearly Meet. Friends, 38. 

Abolition Soc. (1785), 95. 

Cifrj A. s. Soc., 395.' 

Animal Conf, Meth., 428. 

Central College. 507. 
-New York Observer," 176,182. 205. 
218. 

•• Evangelist," 392. 
■• Non-Resistants," 458,512, 618-19, 627, 

534, 539. 
North Carolina, Colonial Slavery, 22. 

i Convention (in 1774), 72 ; Cession 

to U. S., 225 ; Af. Slave Trade, 

261 ; Demands. 413 ; Bap. Asso., 

186. 
X. W. Territory, s: 
" Notes on Virginia," 87. 
"No Union with Slaveholders," 526. 
Nourse, Jos., Reg., 257. 
Nullification (S. C), 338. 

'• Observations" (1774), 75. 

(1779), 78. 
O'Connell, Daniel, M. P., 361. 
Oglethorpe, Gen., 20, 21, 31. 
Ogden, D. B., 193, 396. 
Ohio, " black laws," 340. 

Annual Conf. Meth., 427. 
Olin, S., Pres., 147. 
Onesimus and Philemon, 167-9. 
Onderdonk, Bishop, 193. 
Ordinance of 1787, N. W. Ter., 83. 
•• Organic Sins," 209. 
Oregon Ter., 244. 
Orleans Co. Bible Soc, 212. 
" Orders in Council," Brit., 329. 
Osceola, 270. 

Page, Mr. (Va.), lie. 

Paley, Dr., 28. 

Paine, Robert Treat, 73. 

Paine, Thomas, 131. 

Panama, Congress, 259. 

Parker, Mr. (Va.), 100. 

Parker, Theodore, Rev., 551. 

'■ Pastoral Letter," Meth. E.Bisho;, 



■■.. and Ma 
: 159. 

Peck, J. .M.. KM...-,"!. 
Perm, Wm . 85. 
Penns) Ivania, Abol. s. ,• 

' Hall, burned, i 

ngton, .1. W. Dr., 511. 
Perkins, Q W.. Rev., 174. 

Petitions to I 1, 'J7, 221. 

Persecution-^, i:; i. 

Phelps, A. A. Rev., 207-8,410 11, 159 

Phila. '• Yearly Meeting" Friend", 86. 

Phillips, Wendell. 517-18, 528. I 

Pigott, Arthur, Sir. 62. 

Pike, •!. G . !Iuv„ 360. 

Pinckney, Wm., 82, 583. 

Pinney, J. B., 851. 

Pitt. Wm.. 28,57,62,64-6, 282. 

Plummer, W.S,Dr, 411. 

Political Power of Slaveholders, 184 

Economy, controlled by, 81 9. 
Polk, J. K., Pres., 297, 301-3, 309. 
Pope Leo X., 27. 
Port Byron Convention, 475. 
Porteus, Bishop, 27. 
Portland, Duke of, 36. 
Postell, J. C, liev., 412. 
Post-office, Charleston, S. C, lie. 
Postmaster-General, 416. 
Prejudice va. color, 139, 200. 
Presbyterian Ch, 107-8, 138, 151,24'.'. 

General Assembly, 152, 155-6. 

Old School, 155-6. 

New School, 157-9, 161-2. 

Synod, Kentucky, 152, 381. 
S. Carolina and Georgia, 381 
Press, periodical, 389. 
Presidents U. S, list of, dates. 221. 
Price, Dr.. 20. 
Primatt. Dr., 29. 
Princeton Repertory, 151. 

Theological Seminary, 14. 
Protestant Episcopal Church, 191. 

Society, <fcc, S. C. 192. 

"The Churchman," 192. 

Theological Seminary, 193. 

Convention, Penn, 194. 
Protestant Meth. Church, 195. 
Prohibitions Slavery by Congress, 241-2 
Puritans of England. 12. 

; Queen Victoria. 218, 2 
Quincy, Josiah, 2 
Qoincy, Edmund. ■ 

Randolph, Peyton, 73. 

Randolph. Mr"., i Fed. Con v.) 84, 85, 228 



G02 



GENERAL INDEX. 



Randolph, Thos. J., 248. 

Randolph, Jno. of Roanoke, 241, 260, 384. 
Rankin, John, Rev., 387, 490. 
Ravnal, Abbe, 29. 
Reeve, Judge, 11. 
Reform Bill, England, 361. 
Reformers, divided, 448. 
Religious bodies vs. slavery, 32. 

Anniversaries, (1825-1830), 387. 

Revivals, (1825 to 1830) 388. 
Restorationists, 190. 
Review of divisions, 559. 
Rhode Island, colonial laws, 12, 13. — 
Yearly meeting, 37. 

Ratification Fed. Const., 89. Abol. 
Soc., (1786) 96. 

Election, (1820) 384.— Legisla- 
ture, (1835) 416. 
Right of Petition, 422. 
Riley, Gen., 311-12. 
Rio Grande, 299. 
Robertson, History, 5. 
Robertson, Win., Dr., 29. 
Rochester, Bishop of, 28, 62. 
Rogers, W. W., Rev., 172. 
Rogers, N. P., 454, 476, 519, 530. 
Romans, abolition, 368. 
Roman Catholics, 195, 201. 
Roszell, S. G., Rev., 127. 
Rousseau, J. J., 31. 
Royal Navy and Slave Trade, 66. 
Rutledge, John, 74. 
Rutledge, Edward, 75. 
Russell, John, Lord, 66. 
Rush, Benj., Dr., 29, 96. 

Sabbath, Anti, 460, 546. 

St. Domingo, "horrors of," 139, 370. 

St. Thomas' Church, 194. 

Sandiford, Ralph, 40. 

San Jacinto, battle, 277. 

Santa Anna, defeat, 277. 

San Francisco taken, 300. 

pro-slavery vote, 313. 
San Jose, meeting, 311. 
Sawyer, J. W., Eld., 504. 
Savannah River Bap. Asso., 185, 496. 
Scoble, John, (London) 360. 
Scott, Mr., of Pennsylvania, 101. 
Scott. Winfield, Gen., in Mexico, 301-2. 
Scott, Orange, Rev., 427, 590. 
"Science, the," (slaver) 257. 
Sectarian rivalry, 138. 
Secession Church, Kentucky, (1805) 108. 
Semple, Robert B., 187. 
Seminole War, 270. 
Sewell. S. E., 419. 
Seward, Wm. H., 485. 



Sharp, Granville, 21, 44-60, 77, 104. 

Sharp, Daniel, D.D, 497. 

Shannon, Mr., Mia to Mexico, 296, 313. 

Shaw, Judge, (Mass.) 111. 

Sims, E. D., Prof, 147. 

Slade, William, Hon., 525. 

Slave States, admitted, 237. 

Slave trade, African, origin of, 4. 
by the Colonists, 11. 
efforts to abolish, 53. 
unsuccessful, 66. 

denounced by First Congress, 73. 
resumed by individuals, 122. 
Federal Gov., action, 256-260. 
American or Domestic, 247-9. 
in Federal District, 244. 

Slavery in American Colonies, 10. 
in England, 44. 

distinctive features in U. S., 377. 
unconstitutional, 475, 573-8, 587. 

Slavery question in America, 583. 

Slaveholding and traffic illegal : 

Testimony of G. Sharp, 50. — 
Blackstone, 28.— Wm, Pitt, 64-5. 
—Lord Mansfield, 51, 63.— Dr. 
Hopkins, 76. — James Madison, 
84,— Mr. Scott, (M. C.) of Pa., 
101.— Methodist Confer., (1780) 
106.— John Randolph, 244.— T. 
Clarkson, 356. — Mr. Mason and 
Mr. Bayly of Va., 570-2. 

Slaveholding and traffic called "Man- 
stealing," " robbery," or " theft," 
by Bishop Porteus and Richard 
Baxter. 27— John Wesley, 27-8 
— Grotius, Dr. Jonathan Edwards, 
and Charles James Fox, 28 — 
Macknight and Scott, (Commen- 
tators) 29— Abraham Booth, 30 
— Presb. Ch , IT. S., (from 1794 till 
1816) 107-8— Philadelphia year- 
ly meeting of Friends, 35-6. 

Slaveholding Missionaries — Am. Hoard, 
J. Wilson, Africa, 203 — Baptists, 
Mr. Bushyhead, Cherokees, 187— 
Mr. Davenport, Siam, 187— Mr. 
Tryon, Texas, 188 — Twenty-six 
employed by Am. Baptist Home 
Miss. Soc., 188— J. Finch, 206. 

Slidell, Mr., Minister to Mexico, 297. 

Sloat, Commodore, 300. 

Smith, P. F., (Presb. Gen. Assemb.) 160. 

Smith, Ethan, Rev., 217. 

Smith, Gerrit, 405, 463, 513, 556. 

Smith, E., Rev., (Wesleyan) 492. 

Smith. Lionel, Sir, 373. 

Smylie, .Tames. Rev., 199. 

Smylie, Mr., (M. C.) 260. 



GENERAL INDEX. 



C03 



Smythe, Alexander, Qen., S82. 

Societies, voluntary, 802. 

Son* rset, James, (-lave case) 49. 

Somers, 0. ( '., Rev., 494. 

Soule, Bishop, 117. 

Southampton [nsurrection, 892, 688. 

South Carolina, Colonial slavery, 22. 

decrease of slaves, 1 1790) 106. 

African Slave trade, 122. 

Nullification, 88& 

demands, 1 13. 

Ann. Cunt'. Mefch., 148. 

Synod, Presb., 381. 
■s. W. Chr. Adv." 199. 
Spark-. Jared, 1'res., 172. 
Spencer, John C, 574. 
Spooner, Lysander, 22,25, 470. 
Spring, Gardner, D.D., 155, 218,351, 112. 
Stanley. Mr, of N. 0, 321. 
Stanley, Mr.. Colonial Sec. (Eng.), 371. 
Stapylton, Mr., -IS. 
Stale Governments, on Slavery, 339. 
State Constitutions (1770) vs. Slav., 573. 
Stewart, Mr. (111.), 153. 
Stewart, A Ivan, 463, 469, 471,476, 556. 
Stiles, Ezra, Pies, 96. 
Storrs, I leorge, 138. 
Storrs, 0. B, Pres.,895. 
Story, Judge, 576. 
Stowe, Baron, Rev., 497-8, 504. 
Strong, Jonathan (slave), 46. 
Stroud, Judge, 11, 12, 22, 23, 25. 
Sturge, Joseph (Eng.), 360. 
Stuart, Charles, 360. 
Stuart, Moses, Prof., 166, 172. 
Suffield, Lord, 371. 

Suffrage, Universal, vs. Slavery, 461-2. 
Sullivan, Win., Hon., 409. 
Sunderland, La Roy, Rev., 412, 42,8 434, 

490. 
Supreme Court U. S., 19, 256, 574. 
Swedenborgians, 548, 553. 
Synod, Presb. Kentucky, 152, 199. 

Cincinnati, 166. 

Philadelphia, 429. 

S. Carolina and Georgia, 381. 

Tammany Hall Meeting, riotous, 395. 
Tappan, Arthur, 392, 395-6, 410, 468. 
Tappan, Lewis, 392, 396, 434, 463, 511. 
Tariff, 322, 336-8. 
Taylor, Zachary, Gen., 270, 299, 302, 

308-9, 317. 
Taylor. Nathl W, D.D., 473. 
Tennessee, admission of, 235. 
Bap. Miss. Asso., 501. 
Territories U. S., 238. 
Texas, acquisition of. 272 7". 



Thome, Jamea A., Rev 

Thompson, Jud re, 256. 

Thompson, Wad.lv, Hon, 280, 800 

Thompson, George (Missionary ), I I 

Thompson, I leorj e (W P.), 860. • 

Thomson, Andrew, Dr, 

Thornton, Pres, l 17. 

Todd, Francis, 891. 

Torrey, Charles T, Rev., 442. 

Tracy, Trial,. Hon, 97. 

Tracy, Joseph, Rev, 182, 402. 

Trefusis, Capt, 867. 

Treat, S. B, Sec Am. Board 

Triepuial Conv. Bap. (see Baptists.) 

Tripoli, war. 282. 

Triat, Mr, 804-6. 

Turner, Nat , insurrection, 

Tyler, Bennett, D.D., 176. 

Tyler, John, Pies., 275, 289, 295-6, 52u. 

Unconstitutionality of Slavery, 476, 

573-8, 587. 
Union of the Colonies (1774), 72. 
Unitarians, 196, 548, 661. 
Universalists, 196,548, 653. 
U. S. Mail, rifled, 411. 
U. S. forces /'.«. slave insurrection, 558. 
U. S. Bank, 327, 336. 
U. S. Supreme Court, 19, 256, 574. 
Upshur, Judge, 274, 295. 
Utah. 317. 

Van Buret), Martin, Pres., 276, 278, . 

321, 422, 478, 479-80. 
■• Vesuvius capped," 157. 
• Vermont Chronicle," 182, 402. 
Victoria, Queen, 218, 373. 
Virginia, early character, 19-20. 

Colonial Slavery, 19. 

Conv. (1774), 71 ; action, 75, 110. 

Abolition Society, 96. 

Revised Code, 381. 

demands on North, 414. 

Colonization Scheme, 342. 

Bap. Asso. 493. 

Friends' Yearly Meeting, 38. % 
Voluntary Societies, The, 202. 

Walker, Mr. (Wis.), 308. 
Walker, Jona, Capt, 489. 
Walker, J. B. Rev, 492. 

Walworth. R. 11., Chancellor, 203,045, 

396. 
Warburton, Bishop, 27. 
War. It. •volution, effects, 128. 
'-12. Brit, 881. 
Mexican, 287. 
lei It. 556. 



604: 



GENERAL INDEX. 



Washington, George, Gen.. 10, 72, 14, 81. 

231, 236. 
Washington, Madison (col'd), 254. 
" Washington Union, The," 303. 
• Washington, Judge, 342, 344. 
Watson's Theol. Inst.. 149. 
Waugh, Bishop, 429.' 
Way land, Francis, Pres., 181, 505. 
Webster, Dan'l, Hon., 229, 254, 301, 301, 

339, 418, 584. 
Welch, B. T., D.D., 504. 
Wesley, John, 14, 21, 60. 
Weslevan Meth. Church, 150. 

Meth. Conf. (Eng.), 421. 
West Indies, Abolition, 353. 

Colonial Leg., 351. 

English Missionaries, 362. 

Slaveholders, violence, 362-4. 

Wesleyan Chap, destroyed, 366. 
White, Bishop, 194. 
Whitefield, George, Rev., 14-15. 
Whitney's Cotton Gin, 132. 
Whittier, John G, 396. 
Wilberforce, William, 51-62, 355-361, 

393 
William III, statute of, 8. 
William IV., 59, 361. 
William and Marv, Univer. (Va.). 104. 
Williams, R. G., 105, 413-14. 



Williams, Judge (Ct.), 203, 20S. 

Wilson, Dr., Rev., 492. 

Wilson, James (Pa), 84. 

Wilson, Mr., Missionary, 203. 351. 

" Wilmot Proviso," 304. 

Wisconsin Ter., 244. 

Wise, Henry A.(Ya.), 288,412. 

Witherspoon, .Thos. S.j DD., 44, 155. 

Wives, bought in Va., 19. 

Woolman, John, 41. 

Woodbridge (N. J.) Anti-Slavery Meet- 
ing, (1183), 94. 

Woods, Leonard, D.D, 112, 203, 208, 
351. 

Woods, Leonard, Jr., 409. 

" Woman Question, The," 454, 462, 518. 

Work, Alanson, 440. 

World's A. S. Conv., 511. 

Wright, Theo. S., 511. 

Wright, Elizur, Jr., 395, 461. 

Wright, Henry C, 539. 

Ximines, Cardinal, 5. 

Yates, Mr., of N. Y. (Congress), 83. 
York and Talbot (Eng.), 45-6, 52. 

" Zion's Watchman," 428 
Zong, Ship, (slaver), 55. 



605 



APPENDIX. 



In Chap. XLV., page 537, allusion is made to the position of Ret. S 
uel J. May, at the Conventional Buffalo in 18 IS, that nominated ' 

Van Buren. Tlie Author, having understood that Mr. May did not con- 
sider his position correctly represented, addressed to him a letter, and has 
received an answer, containing his explanation, in substance, as follows : — 
"'I have never," says Mr. M., "done much to aid the Liberty party or 
the Free Soil party, as such, though I have attended their meetings 
they have been held in Syracuse, and in the neighborhood, and have taken 
part in their proceedings so far as they have seemed to be tending to el< 
and quicken the Anti-Slavery sentiment of the people. Bat I have th 
it wiser whenever Abolitionists voted, so to direct their attention, at tin 
as to ensure the election of the most Anti-Slavery man that either of the 
parties could be induced to put in nomination. Much was effected by this 
coarse in Massachusetts," &c. 

• Mr. M. proceeds to sav that, on the eve of the Buffalo Convention, he 
" felt the mighty stir of the people" — " threw himself into the current, was 
borne along to Buffalo," and attended the great meeting in the tent ; where, 
on invitation, he offered prayer " for the immediate and unconditional eman- 
cipation of all the enslaved," and also " addressed them, in a speech of ten 
or fifteen minutes, that was as purely Anti-Slavery, of the Garrison stamp, 
as he was able to frame." When he learned " that Martin Van Buren was 
to be nominated, he remonstrated," and when he " found it was inevitable," 
lie " left the mass meeting, unwilling to be present." The nomination and 
the Platform had been determined upon by a separate meeting of a few hun- 
dred men in a church, not far from the tent, but were afterwards "ratified 
by those in the tent, who had no power to alter or amend any of the doings 
of the Convention proper." At the election, he " voted openly for Gerrit 
Smith, as the most emphatic testimony he could give against the action of 
the Buffalo Convention." And recently, he voted for John P. Hale. Mr. 
M. also states that, after the Buffalo Convention, he denied, in the Anti- 



606 APPENDIX. 

Slavery papers, the statement that had been made, that he "gave his han I, 
heart, and voice, to the measures adopted." 

It was on this statement of the papers that we relied, in writing the His- 
tory, not having observed the correction of it. The sentence we have 
italicized confirms our account of the general policy of the Garrison Abo- 
litionists in respect to political action. The reader will judge whether or no 
the policy avowed by Mr. M. would not naturally result in the support of 
Mr. Van Buren and the Buffalo Platform, in preference to the previous 
course and nominees of the Liberty Party, though Mr. May declined giving 
his maxim that particular application, as he was reported to have done. 



The editor of the Pennsylvania Freeman complained that injustice had 
been done, in the History, to the friends of Mr. Ginison. But on inquiry, 
he failed to specify any mis-statements, and only complained of omissions — 
as the following : — (1.) That the Boston rally of Garrisonians, to at- 
tend the Annual Meeting at New York, in 1840, was occasioned by an 
attempted rally by the New York Committee. (2.) That some, of the 
women who came with Mr. Garrison voted on the other side. (3.) That 
the transfer of the Emancipator was " only three weeks " before the An- 
nual Meeting and division, whereas the History had stated it as being " a 
short time before the division !" (4.) That Lewis Tappan, in a letter to a 
friend in England, had acknowledged that the transfer was made to prevent 
the paper from going into the hands of Mr. Garrison and his friends. Our 
apology for the omission of these facts (if they are facts) is our ignorance 
of them. We readily give them, as being the statements of Mr. Oliver 
Johnson, with the additional remark that, excepting the third item (which 
seems to us a frivolous correction) we find the statements to be disputed 
ones. 



Some friends of the " New Organization " think we have been partial 
towards Mr. Garrison and his friends. Our aim has been to be impartial. 
We must be permitted to see with our own eyes, and our readers must do 
the same. We may add that the criticisms on our book, thus far, have not 
successfully disproved our impartiality, but, on the contrary, have confirmed 
our general view. 



APPENDIX TO THE THIRD EDITION. 



In the Liberator, July 15, 1853, Samuel May, Jun., (not Samuel J 
Way,) Agent of the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society, chargi d raj 
History with "mis-statements" and "errors," declaring it to be "un- 
true and untrustworthy." In the same paper for July 29, 1 demanded 
"proof or retraction." Mr. May replied by declining to give either, 
and devolving it upon the "Board of Managers," whose Agent he 
was, to dispose of the matter. Accordingly, the Board took action 
by repeating the general charges, but attempting no proofs of them, 
and making no specifications of my "mis-statements' 1 or "errors.'' 
This appeared in the Liberator of Sept. '2. I then addressed ^,r. 
May and the Board, reminding them of their awkward position, and 
of the "invaluable testimony" they had unwillingly furnished me, of 
the truthfulness of my History, of which Gerrit Smith had said 
"It hoes justice to all — injustice to none." At a meeting of 
the Hoard, Oct. 12, my letter was laid before them, and it was voter 
to publish it, and "that no reply to said letter is necessary." This 
appeared in the Liberator of Oct. 21. In all this, there was a mani- 
fest care not to repeat the frivolous and absurd specifications of Ml 
Oliver Johnson in his Pennsylvania Freeman. And nothing more 
important or congruous, in that direction, appears to have occured to 
them. One thing, however, they could do, and they did it. They 
forbade their efficient agent, Daniel Foster, to sell my impartial 
History, which they could not impeach, and thus drove him from their 
employ. And why was all this? My account of the division in the 
Society was taken from the recorded proceedings and public Journals, 
including their own. I gave them full credit for their anti-slavery 
labors. But I showed (as every impartial historian of the times must 
show) that they were not the onh/ faithful abolitionists in the country 
— that as much good had been done by those whom they ostracise. 
as had been done by themselves, and that, in common with other 
abolitionists, and with earnest reformers in general, they, too, had 
changed their position, had sometimes fallen into errors, and had fill- 
ed of consistency in some particulars. In doing this, I could not 
help disturbing their exclusive pretensions, and this gave them offenci 
I console myself with the consciousness of having discharged my 
duty, and with the assurance that / have writU n the history as it will 
stand, in all coming time. 

WILLIAM GOODLLL. 



4 



